US ‘closer to civil war’ than most would like to
believe, new book says
Academic and member of CIA advisory panel says
analysis applied to other countries shows US has ‘entered very dangerous
territory’
Martin
Pengelly in New York
@MartinPengelly
Mon 20 Dec
2021 16.30 GMT
The US is
“closer to civil war than any of us would like to believe”, a member of a key
CIA advisory panel has said.
The
analysis by Barbara F Walter, a political science professor at the University
of California at San Diego who sits on the Political Instability Task Force, is
contained in a book due out next year and first reported by the Washington
Post.
At the same
time, three retired generals wrote in the Post that they were “increasingly
concerned about the aftermath of the 2024 presidential election and the
potential for lethal chaos inside our military”.
Such
concerns are growing around jagged political divisions deepened by former
president Donald Trump’s refusal to accept defeat in the 2020 election.
Trump’s lie
that his defeat by Joe Biden was caused by electoral fraud stoked the deadly
attack on the US Capitol on 6 January, over which Trump was impeached and
acquitted a second time, leaving him free to run for office.
The “big
lie” is also fueling moves among Republicans to restrict voting by groups that
lean Democratic and to make it easier to overturn elections.
Such moves
remain without counter from Democrats stymied by the filibuster, the Senate
rule that demands supermajorities for most legislation.
In
addition, though Republican presidential nominees have won the popular vote
only once since 1988, the GOP has by playing political hardball stocked the
supreme court with conservatives, who outnumber liberals 6-3.
All such
factors and more, including a pandemic which has stoked resistance to
government, have contributed to Walter’s analysis.
Last month,
she tweeted: “The CIA actually has a taskforce designed to try to predict where
and when political instability and conflict is likely to break out around the
world. It’s just not legally allowed to look at the US. That means we are blind
to the risk factors that are rapidly emerging here.”
The book in
which Walter looks at those risk factors in the US, How Civil Wars Start, will
be published in January. According to the Post, she writes: “No one wants to
believe that their beloved democracy is in decline, or headed toward war.”
But “if you
were an analyst in a foreign country looking at events in America – the same
way you’d look at events in Ukraine or Ivory Coast or Venezuela – you would go
down a checklist, assessing each of the conditions that make civil war likely.
“And what
you would find is that the United States, a democracy founded more than two
centuries ago, has entered very dangerous territory.”
Walter, the
Post said, concludes that the US has passed through stages of “pre-insurgency”
and “incipient conflict” and may now be in “open conflict”, beginning with the
Capitol riot.
Citing
analytics used by the Center for Systemic Peace, Walter also says the US has
become an “anocracy” – “somewhere between a democracy and an autocratic state”.
The US has
fought a civil war, from 1861 to 1865 and against states which seceded in an
attempt to maintain slavery.
Estimates
of the death toll vary. The American Battlefield Trust puts it at 620,000 and
says: “Taken as a percentage of today’s population, the toll would have risen
as high as 6 million souls.”
Sidney
Blumenthal, a former Clinton adviser turned biographer of Abraham Lincoln and
Guardian contributor, said: “The secessionists in 1861 accepted Lincoln’s
election as fair and legitimate.”
The current
situation, he said, “is the opposite. Trump’s questioning of the election … has
led to a genuine crisis of legitimacy.”
With
Republicans’ hold on the levers of power while in the electoral minority a
contributing factor, Blumenthal said, “This crisis metastasises, throughout the
system over time, so that it’s possible any close election will be claimed to
be false and fraudulent.”
Blumenthal said
he did not expect the US to pitch into outright civil war, “section against
section” and involving the fielding of armies.
If
rightwing militia groups were to seek to mimic the secessionists of the 1860s
and attempt to “seize federal forts and offices by force”, he said, “I think
you’d have quite a confidence it would be over very, very quickly [given] a
very strong and firm sense at the top of the US military of its constitutional,
non-political role.
“… But
given the proliferation of guns, there could be any number of seemingly random
acts of violence that come from these organised militias, which are really
vigilantes and with partisan agendas, and we haven’t entered that phase.
“The real
nightmare would be that kind of low-intensity conflict.”
The retired
generals who warned of conflict around the next election – Paul Eaton, Antonio
Taguba and Steven Anderson – were less sanguine about the army.
“As we
approach the first anniversary of the deadly insurrection at the US Capitol,”
they wrote, “we … are increasingly concerned about the aftermath of the 2024
presidential election and the potential for lethal chaos inside our military,
which would put all Americans at severe risk.
“In short:
We are chilled to our bones at the thought of a coup succeeding next time.”
Citing the
presence at the Capitol riot of “a disturbing number of veterans and
active-duty members of the military”, they pointed out that “more than one in
10 of those charged in the attacks had a service record”.
Polling has
revealed similar worries – and warnings. In November, the Public Religion
Research Institute asked voters if they agreed with a statement: “Because
things have gotten so far off track, true American patriots may have to resort
to violence in order to save our country.”
The poll
found that 18% of respondents agreed. Among Republicans, however, the figure
was 30%.
On Twitter,
Walter thanked the Post for covering her book. She also said: “I wish I had
better news for the world but I couldn’t stay silent knowing what I know.”
Politicians face violence and threats from voters
— and each other. Are we nearing a civil war?
The signs give cause for concern. America suffers from
societal and political conditions that predispose it to violence, and the list
seems to be growing.
Republicans
face death threats after backing Biden’s infrastructure bill
NOV. 12,
202111:42
Nov. 14,
2021, 11:35 AM CET
By Brian
Michael Jenkins, senior adviser to the president of RAND
Last week,
an anonymous caller told a Republican congressman who voted with Democrats in
favor of the infrastructure bill that he and his staff should die. On Monday,
Twitter added a warning label to a cartoon video shared by a different
Republican congressman in which he assassinated a colleague from across the
aisle. On Wednesday, a Black Lives Matter organizer threatened “bloodshed” if
New York’s mayor-elect reinstated a controversial anti-crime police unit. On
Friday, an interview was released in which former President Donald Trump
defended rioters calling for the hanging of his vice president.
The
Covid-19 pandemic exacerbates political and geographical differences, leading
to social warfare in schools and airports and hospitals over mask and vaccination
mandates.
In January,
a new member of Congress vowed to come to work armed. Another admitted that,
barricaded in his office as a mob coursed through the halls of the Capitol on
Jan. 6, he thought he might have to use his own gun to defend himself. Still
another member of Congress had a gun pointed at him during a town hall meeting.
And one of the 10 Republicans who voted to impeach Trump — fearing for the
safety of his wife and children — decided not to seek re-election.
At least
one noted American historian is comparing today’s pugnacious politics with that
of the republic in the years leading up to the Civil War. And indeed, Americans
around the country seem to endorse bellicose behavior. According to a survey
published on Nov. 1, 18 percent of all Americans (30 percent of Republicans, 17
percent of Independents and 11 percent of Democrats) believe that “patriots”
might have to resort to violence to save the country. Another poll earlier in
the year found that 46 percent of people thought the country was somewhat or
very likely to have another civil war.
Are they
right? Does America’s increasingly uncivil behavior mean we are heading toward
civil war?
The signs
on the road ahead give cause for concern. America suffers from a list of
societal and political conditions that predispose it to violence, and the list
seems to be growing longer. At the same time, states that have always defended
their sovereignty are more and more defiant of federal authority, which they
characterize as increasingly intrusive and tyrannical. The Covid-19 pandemic
exacerbates political and geographical differences, leading to social warfare
in schools and airports and hospitals over mask and vaccination mandates.
This has
prompted renewed talk of secession. But that does not mean that civil war is on
the horizon. For one thing, talk of secession is still just talk. The slouching
of both political parties to their right and left extremes increases numbers
and noise on the far edges. But most people have little time for political
posturing and zealots’ fantasies.
The
bellicose rhetoric and belligerent behavior displayed by and toward some of our
elected officials also do not mean a civil war — a military contest between the
states — is inevitable or even probable. A more likely scenario is a turbulent
era of civil disturbances, armed confrontations, standoffs, threats,
assassination attempts and other acts of political violence — in other words,
one that is a lot like the last 200 years of American history.
Indeed,
much of what we are seeing now has ample precedents. Those precedents don’t make
our current circumstances any less ugly, but they do mean that we have been
through similar outbreaks before and survived. However, just as civil war is
not inevitable, there is no guarantee that the republic will not be fatally
weakened or that the union will last — though the tensions we see nationwide
seem more likely to produce localized brutishness rather than centralized armed
conflict.
As the
French political scientist Alexis de Tocqueville noted after touring the United
States nearly two centuries ago — when democracy was still an uncommon form of
government — what gave the country strength was that Americans had a strong
sense of community. Today, the catalog of trends currently eroding that sense
of community is depressingly long.
The
increased polarization of our political system tops the list. It is a long-term
trend, beginning in the 1970s, according to research at the RAND Corporation,
that now manifests itself in the demonization of political opponents as primal
enemies — tyrants, traitors, terrorists.
Polarization
has also contributed to the loss of comity in political discourse, which has
turned into crude insults, ad hominem attacks and the notion that profanity
displays authenticity. Contemporary political rhetoric is seemingly intended to
inflame passions, at times bordering on criminal incitement. Some news channels
and the internet (along with foreign influence operations) stoke the
differences, and facts are often irrelevant.
This
uncivic culture makes vicious attacks and harassment of public officials
common, discouraging ordinary people from entering public service while
attracting zealots. And some political campaigns have gone to the dark side,
with opaque financing and front organizations to evade campaign rules and
tinker with the voting process. The mere advertisement that they are doing so
calls into question the legitimacy of elections. It is behavior suitable to the
Kremlin, not democracy.
Irreconcilable
differences on social issues reinforce the political divide. Differences over
racial injustice, abortion, gun control, immigration and LGBTQ rights
increasingly determine whom one is willing to associate with, reinforcing
self-segregation along political lines as we group with like-minded friends and
partners.
Even within
communities, Americans do fewer things together. Church attendance is
declining. Membership in civic organizations and lodges has been decreasing for
decades. PTA membership has dropped by nearly half of what it was in the 1960s.
Bowling leagues have almost disappeared. And the shared national experience of
military service disintegrated with the abolition of conscription in 1973.
Meanwhile,
self-proclaimed citizen militias — driven mainly by far-right conspiracy
theories — have surged since 2008, and especially in the past five years. The
militia movement, estimated at around 100,000 members, differs from but
overlaps with white supremacist, anti-Muslim, anti-immigration, anti-left and
misogynist groups in a constellation held together by their shared hatred of
the federal government.
Americans
don’t even have a sense of shared history. Is America’s story one of a moral
crusade dedicated to defending the inalienable rights of life, liberty and the
pursuit of happiness of which we should be proud? Or is it a story of
territorial expansion, slaughter, slavery and imperialism of which we should be
ashamed?
Just as
civil war is not inevitable, there is no guarantee that the republic will not
be fatally weakened or that the union will last.
Yet for all
these breaches, the United States in 1860 was more neatly divided than it is
today. For all the implied homogeneity in “red” states and “blue” states, they
are more complex mosaics — in terms of race, ethnicity and religion — than
north versus south ever was. That bodes against a binary breakdown.
And in
1861, the country was primarily separated by a single issue — the survival of
slavery. Our situation today is far more fractured — a kaleidoscope of disputes
that may promote extremism but impede coalescence into two sides. At the same
time, while younger generations are politically more active, so-called
independents have experienced the most growth since 2004, and whichever way
they lean, their views tend to be less partisan.
Heading
into the Civil War, political loyalties were also more local. People looked to
their state capital rather than to Washington. The United States had existed
for only 73 years (as if only since 1948, from our perspective). The 11
original states to secede had spent an average of less than 50 years in the
union. The economy was far less integrated.
And under
President Abraham Lincoln, the U.S. Army had a mere 10 regiments of infantry.
Today’s U.S. military is a global institution, and state National Guard units
are fully integrated into the U.S. armed forces. The Pentagon avoids
politicization, and it would resist a civil war.
None of
this precludes the real possibility of increased conflict. America has a rich
history of violence. It is sobering to review the long list of armed
rebellions, riots, attacks by and against striking workers and massacres of
Indigenous people, immigrants and minorities that mark our history before and
since the Civil War. But the historical record seems to indicate that the
country has a high tolerance for violence without breaking apart.
Secession
without war is also possible. If a handful of southern states voted to secede,
would the north go to battle to preserve the union? If Californians wanted out,
would South Carolina conservatives fight to keep them in? Or would the attitude
in both cases be good riddance? Most likely, though, we won’t find out.
Of course,
in the current environment, inflammatory events or overreactions could suddenly
plunge the country into widespread disorder. A civil war seems unlikely — but
the threat of civil wars cannot be dismissed.
BU Historian Answers: Are We Headed for Another
Civil War?
Mueller
report has Democrats and Republicans feuding—just how bad could it get?
March 27,
2019
BU Today
staff
https://www.bu.edu/articles/2019/are-we-headed-for-another-civil-war/
A recent
Washington Post headline says: “In America, talk turns to something not spoken
of for 150 years: Civil war.” The story references, among others, Stanford
University historian Victor Davis Hanson, who asked in a National Review essay
last summer: “How, when, and why has the United States now arrived at the brink
of a veritable civil war?” Another Washington Post story reports how Iowa
Republican Congressman Steve King recently posted a meme warning that red
states have “8 trillion bullets” in the event of a civil war. And a poll
conducted last June by Rasmussen Reports found that 31 percent of probable US
voters surveyed believe “it’s likely that the United States will experience a
second civil war sometime in the next five years.”
Is that
legitimately where we stand today in the era of Donald Trump, particularly in
the wake of the ramped-up rhetoric stemming from Special Counsel Robert
Mueller’s report on Russia’s interference in the 2016 election and whether the
Trump campaign coordinated with Moscow, or is Civil War talk just crazy
hyperbole? BU Today put three questions to Nina Silber, a College of Arts &
Sciences professor of history and American studies and the current president of
the Society of Civil War Historians. Silber has done extensive research on the
Civil War over more than two decades and has written several books on the
subject, including Divided Houses: Gender and the Civil War (1992), Daughters
of the Union: Northern Women Fight the Civil War (2005), and most recently,
This War Ain’t Over: Fighting the Civil War in New Deal America (University of
North Carolina Press, 2018). Along with her teaching and research, she has
worked on numerous public history projects, including museum exhibitions at the
Gettysburg National Military Park and film projects on the Civil War and
Reconstruction eras.
So if
anyone would have a knowledgeable perspective on the question of whether we are
headed for civil war, it’s Silber. Read her answers about the proliferation of
headlines referencing the possibility of another civil war.
BU Today:
Democrats are demanding documents from President Trump, his family, and many
associated with him. The political divide seems to be getting worse. Is it
irrational to say this could be the beginning of a civil war?
Silber: I
wouldn’t identify this most recent development [the demanding of documents] as
the “beginning of a civil war” since I’m not sure that reflects anything other
than the political divide we’ve already witnessed for the last several years
and the fact that Democrats are taking steps they could not have taken before
they regained control of the House. More ominous, I think, are indications of
political violence and the willingness to enact political violence. This could
be seen, for example, in the synagogue shooting in Pittsburgh, when the shooter
spoke explicitly about targeting Jews who expressed sympathy for immigrants, or
the recent case of the Coast Guard officer who was making plans to kill
Democrats and journalists. I can imagine a future in which we deal with even
more incidents of, or plans for, political violence—and that’s definitely a
disturbing development. I’m troubled, too, by the role the president plays in
contributing to this atmosphere.
But it
would have to be something else to call this a “civil war.” That would indicate
a willingness on the part of masses of people to engage in violence against
their political enemies. That happened in the 1860s, in part because people had
come to see their political opponents in extreme, even demonic, ways and found
it impossible to find any middle ground. Maybe our politics and culture are
moving in that direction, but I don’t see it yet.
The
political map these days shows so much red in the middle, sandwiched by blue on
the coasts. How is that different from the North vs South divide of the Civil
War?
The
electoral map, at least from the most recent presidential election, does show
blue coasts and a red middle. But I think that’s also a deceptive picture since
we know that in many states, such as Florida, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin,
Michigan, there are deep internal divisions. In other words, it’s not the case
that Florida, Pennsylvania, and others are overwhelmingly Republican. The same
could be said for a number of “blue” states too. The geographic divide today is
less clear-cut, less along solidly sectional lines.
In 1860,
the presidential contest reflected the way the political parties had divided
and had become completely sectionalized. Many Southerners could not even vote
for the Republican Party (which proclaimed opposition to the expansion of
slavery) and the Democratic Party ran one candidate in Northern states (Stephen
Douglas) and a different candidate in Southern states (John Breckinridge).
Fundamentally, the split in the Democratic Party was over slavery: Southern
Democrats were calling for a federal slave code (to regulate and permit slavery
everywhere in the country) and Northern Democrats opposed this. As a result,
the political divide reflected the division in the country between states that
permitted slavery and states where it had been outlawed.
Some
historians have been saying there was a similar political divide in 1860 to
what we’re seeing today. Do you agree?
There may
be a few historians who think the divide is similar, but I think most would say
we’re looking at different patterns in our political divisions, although the
tendency toward heated and extreme political rhetoric might be similar. The
inability to find a political middle ground, certainly in the federal
government, seems also to be similar.
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