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I doubt it will be nationally coordinated. If it really got rolling it would probably look more like The Troubles but scattered across cities, some more violent than others. The biggest hurdle is that it’s not just civilians vs ICE, it’s ICE, cops, and all the Rittenhouse wannabes that assume they’ll get a pass.
But really, what’s going to be the straw that breaks the camel’s back? Blatant election interference? Losing control of Congress but just ignoring it? Running for a third term, or simply refusing to leave office even if impeached or when the term expires?Democracy only works if everyone agrees to play by the rules and let go of power when the voters decide or the time comes. We’ve never had a situation where we might have to forcibly remove someone with that much power and influence that says “fuck your democracy”.
It’ll be a lot of John Browns until city/state leaders start siding with the people in their districts and at that point we’re on the brink of secession and civil war.
Precisely my point, it will look a lot like The Troubles. The major difference is now the government has mass surveillance making it nearly impossible to carry out a guerrilla campaign.
For example, in a 1990s world, Luigi Mangione would never have been arrested. But we have a government who literally is capable of tracking every person through the global camera network, or through cell phone tower connections, or even random comments on social media.
And that’s before the authoritarian capture of the media cycle and social apps. The propaganda is intense these days.
All these factors make it excruciatingly difficult for a spark to light the fire, so to speak.
I’m not entirely convinced Luigi didn’t not want to get caught, I’m curious to see how the trial plays out because I question if he wanted a stage to make a statement or is banking on jury nullification. The botched investigation of Kirk’s death is more telling. It took family ratting him out to put them on the trail. ICE agents are ill trained loose canons that rely on numbers, intimidation, and the confidence no one will fight back. They started a war that now they don’t know what to do with. Meanwhile the FBI Director is making Punisher skull collectible tokens and designing his own custom Nikes and the Secretary of War is adding randoms to their group chat. Mass surveillance is only as efficient as the people operating it, and the people operating it are ego driven cronies who’s qualifications are loyalty.
Local cops are the bigger threat. They’ve been at it longer and are better trained than the deputized rabble of Proud Boys and insurrectionists they call ICE. They also know their cities. Even then, criminal organizations like gangs, bikers, drug traffickers, human traffickers, and others operate across the nation every day. Some of it is allowed because they know and want to build bigger cases, some is missed.
Technology always changes war and fighting with yesteryear’s methods is a sure way to lose. If they started loosing military grade hardware like drones on us we’re epically more fucked. But also, Ukraine has shown you don’t need elite soldiers to fight back, just gamer geeks with good hand eye coordination and access to a 3D printer. Fighting back might not be daily shootouts with the authorities, but more infrastructure and supply chain disruptions.
Minnesota showed how quickly locals will improvise and respond, and how many will join up. They chose to keep it non-violent on their end. The response might be different when presented with the knowledge that there’s no peaceful solution left. It’s all conjecture because this would be the first civil war in a digital surveillance state, a heavily armed surveillance state in an era where drones can kill remotely no matter how many guns you have.
Locals do have the benefit of being local. They know their cities, they know their neighbors, they know the blind spots, they know the infrastructure. What works in LA might not work in Chicago, might be different than a fight in Texas. It will need city and state leadership to be willing to, if not fight, at least run interference with the Feds. If the US goes mask off, full on dictatorship that will not give up power willingly, no one else in the world is going to come save it from itself. At that point you accept it or start testing how to resist while knowing it’s a risk and that you will likely end up in a prison or dead.
There’s no way out of that scenario that doesn’t involve that (and they’re already killing and imprisoning people for far less), and there’s no perfect roadmap for how to pull it off because nobody has tried. It’ll be figure it out as you go. I’ll add that the volume of mass shooters that have spent weeks spewing their hate and posting manifestos on social media before their crimes but failed to get red flagged makes me question how great their mass surveillance and threat detection is. People aren’t even trying to not be caught but fly under the radar.