America's Second Civil War
This topic contains 16 replies, has 6 voices, and was last updated by 
Autumn 2 years, 2 months ago.
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I think we may be head for CW2 especially if Trump loses, but also if he wins, because then those who support him will feel emboldened.
Trump has exacerbated largely dormant resentments of noncollege-educated whites and radical conservatives. The radical conservatives include a lot of police and ex-military folk plus evangelical Christians. This group may not be the majority, but they are armed.
If it happens, there will be no traditional battlefields where army A fights army B. It will be asymmetrical. While the government has uniformed troops, the opposition will look ordinary citizens and will conduct hit and run attacks as well as terror attacks on various scales.
The flames of rebellion will be fanned by Trump’s talent for being on TV, by Fox TV being Fox TV, and by Russian/Chinese/Iranian rumor mongering on social media.
Finally, let’s be clear that Trump is more a symptom than a cause and that the left also has played a part in bringing us to the brink of war.
The left got, as the expression goes, ahead of their skis, and fed racial resentments in the process of seeking equal justice for all.
When I say “racial,” I don’t mean it in the usual sense of believing a race is inferior or not to be trusted. Much of the resentment by the noncollege-educated middle class is really against the government. They see the government giving a helping hand through affirmative action to racial and ethnic minorities in ways they feel places them at a disadvantage. They feel passed over for places at the table by people they feel, rightly or wrongly, are less deserving to be receiving governmental favor. And I say it’s not traditional racism because often they work shoulder to shoulder with black and Hispanics, go to each other’s backyard barbecues, and even live on the same block. Their gripe is with the government picking winners and losers, as they see it.
But, to be sure, some of it comes down to good old fashioned “they look different” tribal racism. Most white Americans know people like that, but they are a distinct minority among the disaffected.
If we want to head off CW2 or put out its fires if it starts, we need as a society to think our way out of this dilemma.
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This topic was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by
Unseen.
Unseen,
A very good way of heading off Civl War II is to study just how horrible the first one was.
Before anybody, whether Antifa, Proud Boi, Boog Boi or Black Panther, starts talking seriously about Civil War II in the U.S.A., they need to give this podcast a good hard listen:
War Stuff: Struggle Between Armies and Civilians During the American Civil War
https://www.southcarolinapublicradio.org/post/war-stuff-struggle-between-armies-and-civilians-during-american-civil-war-0Here, historians Walter Edgar and Joan E. Cashin discuss her book War Stuff: The Struggle for Human and Environmental Resources in the American Civil War.
Basically, armies of both the Stars and Stripes and the Stars and Bars plundered not only from civilians from the opposite side, but from civilians that sided with them.
They plundered, degraded, and destroyed everything from forests, crops, food, livestock, houses on up to kidnapping civilian lives to use for labor or ransom, and inflicting untold abuse in the interim.
Also, not covered in the book, both sides commandeered forced labor from those enslaved before the Civil War started. Truly, there were no angels on either side, no matter what school texts teach.
As the author notes, real civil war is not an app to be picked up and played. It is a threat to all that will consume all.
If anybody on any side wants me, they’ll have to come to get me. I’m not making it easy for them.
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This reply was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by
TheEncogitationer. Reason: Spelling. Phone keys and meaty fingers don't do well
Unseen,
CW2 won’t be anything like CW1. It’ll be like gang skirmishes, It’ll involve kidnappings and assassinations. Attacks on businesses run by “enemy” owners.
And, as the historians in the podcast above pointed out, all of those things happened from all sides of Civil War I, including the asymmeteric warfare you mentioned elsewhere on the thread. And Civil War I was the bloodiest conflict this nation was involved in with pretty low tech. A Civil War II with the technology of today could easily dwarf Civil War I.
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This reply was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by TheEncogitationer.
Unseen,
CW2 won’t be anything like CW1. It’ll be like gang skirmishes, It’ll involve kidnappings and assassinations. Attacks on businesses run by “enemy” owners.
And, as the historians in the podcast above pointed out, all of those things happened from all sides of Civil War I, including the asymmeteric warfare you mentioned elsewhere on the thread. And Civil War I was the bloodiest conflict this nation was involved in with pretty low tech. A Civil War II with the technology of today could easily dwarf Civil War I.
I don’t think anyone is predicting battlefield warfare as we saw in CW1. What are you talking about as far as the technology today? I can’t imagine what weapons of today either side could justify using that would kill vast numbers of people. Bombers? Tactical nukes? Really?
I don’t see it going much beyond rifles and maybe IEDs as far as weaponry.
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This reply was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by Unseen.
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This topic was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by
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