"Who would win a 2nd ACW?" Topic

Non-political and fairly well thought out progression of events if central government suddenly ceased. This should be useful for those who like gaming that.

link

Wyatt

Non-political…

Slate.com?

That's funny!

There's another thread about this.

I don't know, but I'm ready & willing to fight in this one.

Wyatt, you beat me to it. I saw the same article this morning.

An interesting premise, and it gives some ideas for scenarios, but I begin losing interest when the nukes start flying and kinda ed that my native state comes out on the losing end.

Hey, what do you want to bet that Jon Davis is a wargamer?

The good guys…..

The Chinese…

Eric

stupid

Texas. They have Oil, close to the mouth of the Mississipi to control the central U.S., and have a business friendly climate. Having a large population doesn't hurt.

Nah. Texas breaks off to become part of Greater Aztlán. It's really the natural order of things.

No one wins. The original Civil War caused about 700-750,000 casualties by the latest estimates. There were about 35.2 million people in the country in 1865 ( link ). That means roughly 2.1 percent of the population dead. The current population is roughly 313,000,000. So, 2.1 percent of that is roughly 6,670,000 people.

Now those are just some rough, 'back of the envelope' type calculations, and we're assuming that weapon lethality is roughly the same for both wars, which obviously would not be correct. That means the numbers could go even higher. Like I said in the first sentence, no one wins.
BWW

Chinese would not win, in this type of proposed situation we'd end up defaulting on all the debt, because there is no way to "split it" among the fragmented (and the international reprecussions of THAT is an entirely new subject.)

California I do not see doing much of anything on their own – my state is broke. A line from about Salinas, over to the Sierra Nevadas and on south would be the, "start," of Aztlan. That would happen before anyone north could do anything about it, and they'd just join up with Oregon and Washington to be enviro-hippie-haven.

Ruskies would take back Alaska for the oil. Bet on it.

Texas would end up coming out of it best of all.

Interesting, but incredibly flawed, aritcle. Its focus on regionalism, as if such would be the only factor in a US-wide civil war, betrays a 19th century view of the US.
For example- How does a "neoConfederacy" arise without serious opposition from the substantial black population?
Similarly, what about the latino populations in the southwest?
What about northern Virginia?
Are Americans really more concerned about their state of birth as opposed to ideology, race or religion?
What happens to a former national military when the nation itself falls? If the soldiers return to their homw states, doesn't that spread the expertise?
How do low population states win against high population states in a modern civil war?
In short, any new ACW would look more like the Spanish Civil war of the 1930s than the largely regional conflict laid out in the article.

Where are the Nukes? This is key too. If we were every crazy enough to go all out against each other, what would stop Nukes from being used?

One of the flaws of this article is that many in Texas, and I am sure other states, aren't from there originally. Dallas, Houston, Austin, San Antonio, etc. all have sizable populations that aren't originally from Texas. There are a lot of military personnel in Texas that wouldn't remain either. Would any state have enough natives to operate all of the former Federal military equipment? How many illegals would leave the states too?

It is an interesting article. Anyone read the Texas/Israeli War near future book? I still can't get over Dimebox being the capital of Texas. I would have guessed one of the BBQ towns in the Hill Country would have top honors ;-)

Pan Marek has it right…how would you identify your "enemy" to begin with?

Well, that's why it's called a civil war now, inn't?

I remember being in Bosnia on my first deployment and the absolute insanity of their civil war was starkly obvious.

Eric

The Stares that control the nukes will tell the rest what they can and can't do.

The nukes issue might be put off until the various factions sort out reasonably stable territories. Again, using my SCW
model, the warring parites might be too close together in various 'mixes' to make nukes practical. Think Beirut in the 70s.
There is also the question of whether one wants to be the conqueror of poisoned property. If, for example, the Neoconfedrates want to add Pennsylvania to their polity, what good does it do them to make it useless?
Of course, all of this would depend heavily on who is in charge of what group, and what their "goals" would be.
The group with the nukes might be led by a sociopath. Or not.

Stupid article. The economic interconnection would doom anything prior to such a war happening. Wall Street would shut down economies with a flick of a mouse. So how do these states buy the gas to go do something? They'd be fighting amongst their own cities. It would be mass chaos, not at all organized.

Texas can't build a road or highway to save their life. And can't manage a budget to repair those that are built. The legislature is about as intelligent as your average steer when it comes to organizing anything. The Mexico border is darn near pointless. And the oil is history. The oil is in North Dakota, not here.

And the article expects this state to do anything? C'mon.

People need to drop this myth about Texas. What spirit there was is in the past, people. It has been diluted by every joe showing up and trying to turn Dallas into a New York and Austin into a playground.

Depends on what you mean by "power" and who gets it. If the Federal Government ceased, and the States took over possession of all of the military personnel and materials in their state, then those with the ICBM sites would have potent threats to other states or nations. Remember, these things are still run on 1950's and 60's technology. Not much high tech stuff in the silos so to speak. So, while North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming and Montana, may have relatively small populations, there are a lot of nuclear warheads in these states, and loads of oil and oil fields.

We all win.

Texas breaks off to become part of Greater Aztlán. It's really the natural order of things.

Hey, and the death penalty can now be carried out as human sacrifice!

The one with the knife could wear a cowboy hat, making it more multicultural.

I'm waiting to watch Augustus be lynched by the New Aztlans.

Anyone read the Texas/Israeli War near future book?

No, but I read the Texas/China War near future book.
link

Yeah, I don't think that the Greater Kansas-Oklahoma Co-Prosperity Sphere's got too much going for it, since they won't have any ports and all roads to Canada will be blockaded.

As for Texas…Augustus nailed it.

Apologies for the threadomancy.
Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, Missouri, North Carolina, and Idaho would have the greatest quantity of WMDs. Georgia, Florida, Washington, and others should be considered as well.

I would see Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana (among others) joining the Republic of Texas.

California I do not see doing much of anything on their own – my state is broke. A line from about Salinas, over to the Sierra Nevadas and on south would be the, "start," of Aztlan.

I doubt it. Most of the Latino population came here for a reason: Zero economic opportunity at home.

That would happen before anyone north could do anything about it, and they'd just join up with Oregon and Washington to be enviro-hippie-haven.

I doubt that too. If there is no government in D.C. then the rural populations who actually own the guns would tell the bozo's in Sacramento to off! Think about it… If the Federal government couldn't hold the USA together, what makes you think the state governments could hold states together? Does anyone really think that the people of Pullman, WA wouldn't tell the people of Seattle to go themselves if given the opportunity? Very 'blue state' California has some very 'red state' counties. These are the counties where power plants are located, where the oil is pumped out of the ground and food is grown.

Canada and Mexico.

If central government broke down, the power struggle that ensued might be centered around Microsoft, Apple, Google, Boeing, Lockheed Martin and such, as they take measures to guarantee their survival.

So, we can consider California, Texas, Washington State, Missouri, and Georgia as prime military-industrial pivot points.

Also consider South Carolina, Mississippi, Arizona, Virginia, and whatever parts of Yankeeland- errrr….New England- have military shipyards.