Aftermath of the militia takeover of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge headquarters

[Bootstoots]

Wishful thinking is a product of fanciful imaginings, not reality. Eight years ago, tons of people imagined that Obama would suffer an assassination attack during his term in office. The reality was that he’s just fine and dandy. Now people are imagining that there will be some sort of armed uprising after Trump loses. The reality is that political violence has been on a steady decline in the United States for many years. The reality is that people in the contemporary United States do not use to protest election results. In 2012, Trump called for revolution after Obama’s victory. The reality was no one listened to him then. They will not listen to similar calls now.

It's not like there's going to be another civil war in the U.S. anytime soon. Where are these people going to get tanks, armoured infantry vehicles, and fighter jets? All they're going to have is a bunch of guns.

The odds of organized violence are small but unusually high for an election in the post-Civil War US. Pulling a number out of my posterior to quantify the feeling in my gut, I'd say there's a ~3-4% chance of sustained violence (mostly something like a lowish-level rural insurgency or a notable organized terrorist campaign, with a full-scale war being much less likely) motivated by the outcome of this election in the year following it. This is how risk works: if you go drunk driving over a distance of 10 miles tonight, you'll survive without being arrested over 99% of the time, but that doesn't mean that the risk of dying/killing someone else/getting arrested is not worth considering. If you go sober driving over the same distance, the odds improve dramatically but obviously stay shy of 100%.

I do not share Commodore's optimism that a rural insurgency would be crushed particularly easily. Of course they would be massively outnumbered and outgunned, and it's nearly certain that no high-level military officers would join the rebels and bring their units with them, but asymmetric warfare rarely ends quickly despite its asymmetry. Militia types tend to be extremely well-armed and live in rural and often rugged areas where it would be very difficult to flush them out. I'm sure they'd lose eventually, but it would not take very many serious rebels to cause a large amount of mayhem over a long period of time.

 

[FriendlyFire]

I'm sure they'd lose eventually, but it would not take very many serious rebels to cause a large amount of mayhem over a long period of time.

They can hijack planes and fly them into buildings like Freedom fighers, .......... NO WAIT
I'd could easily imagine that in the modern age they would resort to lets just say middle eastern terrorism to inflict both economic as well civilian damage. It would be ironic and hyprocritical but then again so was rational for the US Civil war. It will probably start by targeting Blacks or Hispanic civilians and once that line is crossed it will soon be white christian americans being targetted.

I dont see this happening though, not while the US economy is still stable and you have a minimal social welfare in place.

 

[Bootstoots]

Right-wing extremists often target white Christian Americans who happen to be working for the federal government. The government is the target about as often as ethnic or religious minorities, and it is the target in particular of the Sovereign Citizen movement. The militia movement in general is more anti-government than anti-minority.

This would be a fairly minor and bloodless (on the government side) example of anti-government militia behavior. The biggest so far would be the OKC attack.

 

[FriendlyFire]

Thats the anti-Federalist, There are also the far right hate groups and fundamentalist
Timothy McVeigh was part of the anti-Federalist group

You can probably imagine that the Republicans having whipped up their base into a frenzy about Obama, from being a Muslim, a Kenyan, destroying the constitution, death panels, Fema camps, indoctrination, benghazi, socialism and unlawful executive orders. Are currently bewildered at why Obama hasnt been impeach and are all voting for Trump. Maybe if were lucky the Republican party will tear itself apart, reaping what it has sown.

That or we can probably expect double the craziness.

 

[Commodore]

And the result was the bloodiest, bitterest war in American history, leaving wounds that never healed. Yet you seem to be very dismissive of how dangerous a repeat would be.

Because a repeat wouldn't be anything like that. It was bloody before because the rebels and government were relatively evenly matched in terms of technology, training, and equipment. This would not be the case in the event of another rebellion. The worst we would see is maybe some National Guard units in the rebelling state might join the rebellion, but they are nowhere near as well-trained or experienced as our active duty forces. Plus, the National Guard gets hand-me-downs when they aren't deployed so their equipment won't be as good either. Not to mention, the National Guard gets all of its munitions from the federal government, so they'd run out of bullets and bombs pretty quick if they rebelled. Especially since the states most likely to rebel aren't states that are known for their booming industrial capability.

Any attempted rebellion would be crushed in short order with the only really worrisome thing being what steps the federal government would then take to ensure another rebellion wasn't possible.

 

[Evie]

I honestly don't see ACW round II happening. And if it did, yeah, I agree it wouldn't last very long.

A sizeable uptick in McVeigh-style homegrown terrorism, politically motivated mass shootings and political murders (not necessarily the president, but more Giffords) appears far more likely, and far harder to solve.

 

[Phrossack]

Because a repeat wouldn't be anything like that. It was bloody before because the rebels and government were relatively evenly matched in terms of technology, training, and equipment. This would not be the case in the event of another rebellion. The worst we would see is maybe some National Guard units in the rebelling state might join the rebellion, but they are nowhere near as well-trained or experienced as our active duty forces. Plus, the National Guard gets hand-me-downs when they aren't deployed so their equipment won't be as good either. Not to mention, the National Guard gets all of its munitions from the federal government, so they'd run out of bullets and bombs pretty quick if they rebelled. Especially since the states most likely to rebel aren't states that are known for their booming industrial capability.

Any attempted rebellion would be crushed in short order with the only really worrisome thing being what steps the federal government would then take to ensure another rebellion wasn't possible.

Which is worrisome. What if 10% of Trumpists decided to stop paying taxes and to take up arms until Congress and the White House were Republican? Diplomacy and reasoning do not work on those kinds of people, violence would just escalate things, and the Russians, Chinese, and Iranians would be sure to make hay while the sun shines and do the things they hadn't yet done out of fear of US interference.

 

[Commodore]

Which is worrisome. What if 10% of Trumpists decided to stop paying taxes and to take up arms until Congress and the White House were Republican? Diplomacy and reasoning do not work on those kinds of people, violence would just escalate things, and the Russians, Chinese, and Iranians would be sure to make hay while the sun shines and do the things they hadn't yet done out of fear of US interference.

Conspiracy theory time: What if Trump is secretly a GRU operative assigned the mission of attempting to start a second American Civil War for the purpose you mention above?

 

[Bootstoots]

Because a repeat wouldn't be anything like that. It was bloody before because the rebels and government were relatively evenly matched in terms of technology, training, and equipment. This would not be the case in the event of another rebellion. The worst we would see is maybe some National Guard units in the rebelling state might join the rebellion, but they are nowhere near as well-trained or experienced as our active duty forces. Plus, the National Guard gets hand-me-downs when they aren't deployed so their equipment won't be as good either. Not to mention, the National Guard gets all of its munitions from the federal government, so they'd run out of bullets and bombs pretty quick if they rebelled. Especially since the states most likely to rebel aren't states that are known for their booming industrial capability.

Any attempted rebellion would be crushed in short order with the only really worrisome thing being what steps the federal government would then take to ensure another rebellion wasn't possible.

So what about the possibility of an asymmetric, guerrilla-style insurgency, which is always the go-to tactic for people who are heavily outnumbered and outgunned? It's incredibly easy to bog down a vastly superior military force with guerrilla tactics; it doesn't require anything more than large amounts of guns and ammo, along with lots of IEDs, logistic support for food and supplies, and a dedicated group or network of groups of a few thousand people who are good at rural survival skills. The sorts of people who are in militias have all of these things: obviously lots of guns and ammo, tremendous amounts of ammonium nitrate fertilizer ready to be converted into bombs, and a large proportion are rural survivalists with large amounts of food and good wilderness skills. They'd also have logistic support from locals who hate the government but aren't quite willing to take up arms personally.

If a loose network of survivalist militias started a rebellion in the Rockies and/or Appalachians, they could cause a lot of damage. Sure, they'd never "win" in the conventional sense, and if they ever tried to fight like a normal military they'd scare people but be crushed quickly, like the Viet Cong during the Tet Offensive. As long as they avoid conventional tactics and stick to guerrilla ones, though, they don't even need elements of the National Guard to come to their aid.

 

[Phrossack]

Conspiracy theory time: What if Trump is secretly a GRU operative assigned the mission of attempting to start a second American Civil War for the purpose you mention above?

Well, the only two things Trump is completely consistent on are his self-worship and his idolization of Putin. In every single case where he has mentioned an issue involving Russia, he has picked Russia's side. Without exception. There's no political reason for him to do so; it's not like there's a major pro-Putin voting bloc to pander to. So this leads to a few possible conclusions. He could have close ties to the Russian government. He could be doing this out of his fanboyish adoration of strongmen; note how he publicly praised Saddam Hussein, of all people, for torturing and executing suspected terrorists without trial. Most likely, it's a bit of both. I don't think he's a literal Russian infiltrator, but he probably has connections to Russia in terms of business dealings that he doesn't want publicized.

In any case, a Trump win would be a major victory for Putin, allowing him to further break up NATO and expand westwards without interference.

 

[Commodore]

So what about the possibility of an asymmetric, guerrilla-style insurgency, which is always the go-to tactic for people who are heavily outnumbered and outgunned? It's incredibly easy to bog down a vastly superior military force with guerrilla tactics; it doesn't require anything more than large amounts of guns and ammo, along with lots of IEDs, logistic support for food and supplies, and a dedicated group or network of groups of a few thousand people who are good at rural survival skills. The sorts of people who are in militias have all of these things: obviously lots of guns and ammo, tremendous amounts of ammonium nitrate fertilizer ready to be converted into bombs, and a large proportion are rural survivalists with large amounts of food and good wilderness skills. They'd also have logistic support from locals who hate the government but aren't quite willing to take up arms personally.

If a loose network of survivalist militias started a rebellion in the Rockies and/or Appalachians, they could cause a lot of damage. Sure, they'd never "win" in the conventional sense, and if they ever tried to fight like a normal military they'd scare people but be crushed quickly, like the Viet Cong during the Tet Offensive. As long as they avoid conventional tactics and stick to guerrilla ones, though, they don't even need elements of the National Guard to come to their aid.

I actually think that type of insurgency would be easily contained. They'd have to stick to hiding in the mountains or risk getting hit by UAV strikes. Also, knowing that they'd have to stick to the mountains, we wouldn't have to spread our military thin trying to protect everything at once. We could concentrate forces on containing them in the mountains.

Not to mention, fighting a domestic insurgency wouldn't put us at the same disadvantage as fighting an insurgency in a far off land. In Iraq and Afghanistan, our forces had to handle everything from carrying out combat operations to day-to-day policing. Such a situation spreads our forces thin and creates gaps that insurgents can exploit. Those gaps wouldn't exist for a domestic insurgency because the Army could focus entirely on fighting them while local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies would handle day-to-day policing and counter-insurgency/terrorism operations in the urban centers.

There's also the matter of experience that I mentioned earlier. There are still plenty of soldiers still serving in our military that took part in the 15 years of counter-insurgency warfare. These survivalist militias on the other hand, may have trained extensively, but have they ever conducted a real guerilla campaign? Have they ever really had to put their training to use to see just how practical their tactics and procedures are? No, they haven't. Compare that to the insurgents we were fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq. Many of those guys were professional insurgents who fought in various civil wars and insurgencies across the Middle East and Central Asia. In Afghanistan, many of the Taliban guerilla leaders were veterans of the war against the USSR. They had experience in fighting against superior military forces and knew exactly what to do once our boys started rolling in. The survivalist militias here in the US do not have that knowledge because they do not have the experience required to gain that knowledge.

 

[Bootstoots]

A number of them are US military veterans, although I think current militia members tend to skew older which would put them at a disadvantage. I don't know how many of the veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan with counterinsurgency skills would join them rather than fight them, given that this is a very disenchanted group of people who might jump at the chance to join something meaningful and martial to fight the government that has largely discarded them. I don't think it would be more than a couple percent, but that would be enough to cause problems (while the vast majority like you would want to fight them). Certainly the logistic situation is much easier for the US in this case, and there's no option of pulling out. But in the case of the few insurgencies/sustained terror campaigns that have occurred in countries with modern militaries in modern times, such as the IRA in NI and the ETA in Spain, they still proved really difficult to root out and were not totally crushed in the end: they ultimately had to be persuaded to lay down their arms.

 

[Traitorfish]

Haven't you noticed the unprecedented nature of this election? When was the last time we had a major candidate openly hint at assassinating his opponent, starting a revolution if he loses, and canceling the election and handing it to himself? You seem committed to a rosy view of things despite the growing evidence that things won't be so rosy.

Trump is saying these things, but is anyone else? One lunatic on a podium, as troubling as he might be, does not make a political culture of violence. Until Republicans start engaging in routine political violence, and at this point even the far-right has limited itself mostly to the theatrical suggestion of violence, Trump's rhetoric doesn't seem to be anything more than rhetoric, and while it's troubling that Trump's rhetoric is appealing, that doesn't necessarily tell you that his audience take it seriously, only that they find the idea they could stand up to the federal government with nothing but a pitchfork and a sense of indignation to be flattering.

 

[Kozmos]

I actually think that type of insurgency would be easily contained. They'd have to stick to hiding in the mountains or risk getting hit by UAV strikes. Also, knowing that they'd have to stick to the mountains, we wouldn't have to spread our military thin trying to protect everything at once. We could concentrate forces on containing them in the mountains.

Not to mention, fighting a domestic insurgency wouldn't put us at the same disadvantage as fighting an insurgency in a far off land. In Iraq and Afghanistan, our forces had to handle everything from carrying out combat operations to day-to-day policing. Such a situation spreads our forces thin and creates gaps that insurgents can exploit. Those gaps wouldn't exist for a domestic insurgency because the Army could focus entirely on fighting them while local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies would handle day-to-day policing and counter-insurgency/terrorism operations in the urban centers.

There's also the matter of experience that I mentioned earlier. There are still plenty of soldiers still serving in our military that took part in the 15 years of counter-insurgency warfare. These survivalist militias on the other hand, may have trained extensively, but have they ever conducted a real guerilla campaign? Have they ever really had to put their training to use to see just how practical their tactics and procedures are? No, they haven't. Compare that to the insurgents we were fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq. Many of those guys were professional insurgents who fought in various civil wars and insurgencies across the Middle East and Central Asia. In Afghanistan, many of the Taliban guerilla leaders were veterans of the war against the USSR. They had experience in fighting against superior military forces and knew exactly what to do once our boys started rolling in. The survivalist militias here in the US do not have that knowledge because they do not have the experience required to gain that knowledge.

You raise good points, but I still don't think it would be that easy. US is basically a Mecca of Arms. Lots of veterans, some of them disgruntled. US is massive, geographically speaking and how do you stop fifth columnists or even garden variety of domestic terrorists emboldened by the insurrection? I mean I can imagine how'd they get stopped, but it won't be really America we can recognize today.

Also Megacities of the future:
http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...rrible-and-dystopian-metropolis-of-the-future

 

[Nexlev]

Did anyone bring up the Obama investigation into LaVoy Finnicums Death?

 

[BvBPL]

FBI agent indicted for lying about role in shooting death of Finicum.

 

[innonimatu]

It's funny to read these old threads after things went exactly opposite the way most people were thinking!

The Trump supporters did not stage a "rebellion", and Trump did not lose. The Hillary supporters are the ones talking incessantly about doing a coup/impeachment, calling the winner a traitor and implying he must be removed by whatever means...

The Bundys and their supporters were cleared in court. The sole person convicted was a blind, wheel-chair disgruntled old man who was tricked by fake journalists (FBI agents in disguise) into making statements against the FBI. Considering that he was physically unable to be a thread, it is political persecution.

To date, the heaviest punishment resulting from the Nevada standoff was levied against Burleson, the Arizona militia member and former FBI informant. In conversations with the FBI film crew, Burleson made a series of self-incriminating boasts about his reasons for joining the standoff as he drank alcohol provided by the undercover agents. Burleson claimed that he was ready, willing, and eager to kill members of law enforcement. Whether he had the capacity for such violence is unclear; the 53-year-old is legally blind, suffers from serious health issues, and now uses a wheelchair for transportation. He was sentenced to more than 68 years in federal prison.

The only people killed in these "militia cases" were those killed by the authorities. I may not share their ideas, but I can see that supporting the violent repression of these people means backing the violent repression of other protesters who defy authorities. It is one thing to imprison people because they pose a real threat, another to imprison them because they because what they say allegedly is dangerous if imitated by others: that was supposed to be protected as free speech, was it not?

I pointed out numerous times that the way the government handled this was well-considered, and it contrasts with how the government handled similar incidents involving people of color.

Too bad that one idiot had to go for his gun.

Did he go for his gun?

In classic fashion, two sides examined the same evidence and saw two different things. To the government, Finicum, 55, was reaching for a loaded gun in his jacket after speeding away from a traffic stop, and the shooting by Oregon State Police troopers was justified.

To thousands of antigovernment activists across the country, the Arizona rancher was a folk hero who became a martyr when, in their view, he was ambushed — shot in the back without a gun in his hand — by overaggressive law enforcement officials who were trying to crush the armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.

But when it came to one mysterious piece of evidence in the case, the two sides were bothered by the same question: Where did the bullet hole in the roof of Finicum's truck come from?

The government offered an answer Wednesday when a member of the FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Team was indicted on suspicion of shooting twice at Finicum during the chaotic encounter and then lying about it to state and federal investigators.

You assumed that the FBI officials were not lying and were "good guys" in this case. Would you have assumed differently if the victim was black?

Can I make a poem like, first they came for those you don't like, and you applaud... then they go for those you like, and toy make a lot of noise about discrimination?

 

[Traitorfish]

One lunatic on a podium, as troubling as he might be, does not make a political culture of violence. Until Republicans start engaging in routine political violence, and at this point even the far-right has limited itself mostly to the theatrical suggestion of violence[...]

aw jeez aw crap i didn't even see it coming

 

[FriendlyFire]

You assumed that the FBI officials were not lying and were "good guys" in this case. Would you have assumed differently if the victim was black?
Can I make a poem like, first they came for those you don't like, and you applaud... then they go for those you like, and toy make a lot of noise about discrimination?

The FBI are clearly the "Gestapo" and there are good Anti Federalist militas that dont carry out terrorist attacks.
Cant we just fast forward to American Civil War part 2 where the North tries to ceed from the Union and the South has to fight a bloody civil war to stop us ?

Honestly, who knew that the Deplorables would manage to vote one of their own into the Presidency ? Thankfully the GOP are up to their usual agenda and it is all overblown.

 

[Berzerker]

JHC it was January in Oregon, they should have left them there until spring to see how enthusiastic they were about actually getting in the way of bureaucrats doing their job. And now I'd like to know if the shots hitting the truck were fired before the guy left it. And I dont have any reason to believe the guy went for his gun either if these people are lying about shots they fired.