The Recent Presidential election, and growing importance on party loyalty, got me thinking about how a second american civil war might come about in a modern or near future setting. This of course spiraled into me looking at minis and my collection and seeing how i could use them to make the idea of The Second American Civil War into a mini game. So without further ado, here is my idea on the start of the conflict that would change (future) America forever...
2065- Tensions between Democrats and Republicans reach a fever pitch, with rioting and violent protests being held at opposing political rallies and at debates.
2066- Early in the year a Democrat is elected to the Office of President of the united states, in what is considered a mockery of an election by many senators, and republicans. Many republicans in the Senate refuse to pass any laws or even to show up to the Capital building for several weeks. The president, makes it clear that he will not stand for this and orders a unit of marines to round up the absentee senators and have them forcefully escorted to the capital. Outrage erupts all across the country.
2068- Growing frustration turns into open rebellion with republican senators and representatives in the house fleeing into hiding across the country and encouraging radical right wing militia groups to actively assassinate Democrat senators, mayors, and judges. The president orders military forces home in an attempt to control the situation, many generals choose to ignore the order to return in the hopes that Republican loyal National Guardsmen and Militia can overrun Washington D.C. and seize power. Other generals loyal to the president catch on, and the crisis spills over into American Military bases in Germany, England, and The Pacific Islands.
2069- Washington is taken by Republican Forces, after a 3 week siege, seeing over 2,000 dead. The President evacuates to a secret bunker in the Northeastern United States. All across the nation, Militia's of various political affiliations go around murdering civilians and "capturing" towns from other parties. With communist, fascist, libertarian, anarchists, and of course republican and democrat troops cutting the former USA into dozens of smaller countries.
The Northeast, and West Coast have stayed staunchly democrat, the South and most of the East Coast has become a bastion for Republican forces. With the central US, becoming a no mans land of warring factions.
Hope you enjoy what you read, might paint up a couple guys here and there, unless this gets overwhelmingly positive feedback.
-Your Favorite Madman-
I think you might need to add a bit more to the original causes to make the political parties become militarized. Possibly a fundamentalist party makes massive inroads to the political scene and that would cause the other parties to seek a military solution to their political agenda.
ReplyDeleteColKG
Yeah, I like that. Mostly wanted to put pen to paper here and gauge reactions. I feel like it escalates to quickly also, and yeah I never give any explanation of how the tension arise to such levels. I think I will explore the idea a bit more, paint up a couple figs maybe squad level and go from there
DeleteYeah, I like that. Mostly wanted to put pen to paper here and gauge reactions. I feel like it escalates to quickly also, and yeah I never give any explanation of how the tension arise to such levels. I think I will explore the idea a bit more, paint up a couple figs maybe squad level and go from there
DeleteScott makes a good point there, we all have our political beliefs but few people in this country are going to be openly violent without a real sense of danger or isolation. Maybe add some more about a collapsing economic structure, or in the period leading up to these events a strengthen of individual state power while there is a weakening of federal power. Some states run at a surplus while others run at severe deficits, that would be excellent place to start an ideological schism. Good so far, I like the idea of a New 'Merican Republic.
ReplyDeleteWas thinking, about having the economy basically fail in america, sending 60-70 % of the population into poverty. But government still continues spending money on military funding, bailouts for big business, and cut their own taxes/increase personal income. Lots of people become angry, blaming opposing parties for their own hardships. Gas is somewhere around 8 $ a gallon, which makes food and everything else go up. Many people are in a real danger of dying of hunger or disease in many parts of the country. The poverty causes an increase in crime, more people become armed to stop criminals, militias form to ensure absolute protection and to act as collectives to buy food, and other neccessities for one another. It is this sort of environment that the above occurs in. Sound good?
DeleteIt definitely makes a second civil war more of a possibility. A decrease in military spending would be more likely to create a small armed forces that would become even more insular and detached from most people. The more removed from the majority of society the army is the more likely they are to openly engage civilians or militias. Also if the military is viewed as weak or incompetent due lack of funding the more likely armed insurrection is. With this kind of conflict it's good to look at the factors that lead to civil wars. A major force behind the Civil War was that the less populated southern states felt threatened by an "overreaching" federal government. As a response they seceded and formed the Confederate States of America creating an opposing force to the existing federal government. It's those kinds of moves that cause the power base to feel threatened and launch mobilization, which threatens the other side into mobilization, and so on. Each action taken or not taken leads both sides closer and closer to war. In the more dystopian setting of your war people are likely to form many small bands or side with the strongest power in their region for personal safety. I like the setting you have so far and would like more of it. Can I carve me off a piece of this "Second Civil War"? I'd like to write in a regional force and back story. Let me know if it's OK to do that, and tell me where in the failed USA I'm allowed to develop it.
DeleteAbsolutely sir! and anywhere you like, i only wanted to put the idea down and play with it, see where you lot took it and if you liked it or not.
DeleteI like the idea (from a gaming, not real world viewpoint!). I don't think that the parties as we know them would necessarily still be around in 50yrs, or that today's issues would still be around. General themes that have been in American politics, sure - central vs states, control vs individualism, big money vs little guy, isolation vs involvement, etc.
ReplyDeleteAs is the main parties are actually pretty close ideologically, if you look at the big picture. Similar goals, different methods of getting there. For a real civil war you'd want a more dramatic split, like in 1930's Spain where the entrenched ruling class and reactionary supporters were very different in outlook and goals from the radical leftists, or Russia's preserve/restore the monarchy crowd and the reds. In the US the South split in an attempt to forestall the kind of societal restructuring they feared was coming.
I could see moving towards an even more dramatic have/have not society leading to revolt/civil war. Corporations play even more by their own rules, the well off wall themselves off in something like Neal Stephenson's burbclaves while the lower classes get progressively worse off until they have nothing to lose. Sort of the cyberpunk/shadowrun type world, but instead of just taking it, the downtrodden start to get organized. An economic collapse or depression could be a good trigger, if the elites have such a hold on power that peaceful change from below is shut out and are shortsighted enough not to care about the new American peasantry's conditions.
I think you could well end up with multiple sides (which makes it even better from a gaming standpoint), fractured along various lines and in various combinations - class (and cross-class supporters), regionalism (likely not strong feelings, but established levers of power), ideology (religion or other beliefs like supremacists). Once different factions stop behaving like the central authority actually has any, the harder it will be to piece things back together. So I think it would probably go more fractured to start with, then different groups start allying/merging as things develop.
Sorry for the long reply! Ex uno plures!
Excellent thought provoking stuff in here! I got a Shadowrun/ Farenheit 451 world in my head, I like the idea of the government basically being almost combined with big business forming a sort of over bearing aristocracy, that feels the need to drive the populace into poverty, as a means of control. Certainly a Near-Future American Civil War, would have more factions, there are more people here now, a different way to wage war where a team of 8-12 guys armed properly could change the world, and thousands of political, religious and economic ideas that people have for the country that given proper circumstances would be willing to die for. (I've gotten very excited to do this project now!)
DeleteIt might be a bit Car Warsesque but a good vegetable blight can shake up any political structure.
ReplyDeleteA bacteria that attacks vegetables devastates world food stocks. Starving citizen mobs start to attack the Corporate compounds trying to get some thing to eat. The corporations in their secure compounds with their security contractor armies hunker down, refusing to share their food stock piles. The corporations put pressure on the Federal government and they pass Bill 4666.9 better known as the "Let them eat cake" bill. The bill nationalizes all food stuffs and orders all Federal, State and local government organizations to confiscate any privately held food item for collection in several regional points. The Food stuffs will then be evenly distributed on basis of need. The outrage is tremendous. The majority of State and local authorities flat refuse. The Federal forces that start accumulating food store it in corporate controlled warehouse complexes. A council of State Governors draw up a declaration that refuses to comply with the law, demands the law be repealed and seized food stuffs be turned back over to the local authorities. The Federal government responds by declaring martial law, issuing orders for the arrest of all the Governors that were signatories to the declaration for treason and sedition. The State respond by mobilizing their National guard units and move to secure any and all federal held military supplies. Some federal units side with the State governments and join the national guard but many more resist with all their modern war making ability. It the chaos, Federal, State and Corporate organization start to arm as many people as possible to support their claims. The new militias formed backfire. Instead of defending the food many take it for themselves. The country slides into a new era of chaos with no clear path out.
Sorry about the wall of text. This allows for at least Federal, State, Local, Corporate, Militia, and criminal factions to play.
I like it. You could say that by this time most of the world's mass-produced food is heavily GM (genetically modified), and in the US agribusiness has largely driven small producers under. The bacteria/pest specifically targets a weakness in the GM food plants, devastating them but leaving normal plants alone for the most part. So wild stuff and the apple tree in your backyard are fine, but the 1000 acre orchard run by ADM gets wiped out. Anything previously harvested and stored is fine, but those supplies won't last long.
ReplyDeleteIt would make for some interesting scenarios. Such as " Your troops have heard that the next town has a truck load of oranges."
ReplyDeleteIt seems that the modern civil war is just a hairs breath away from a post apocalyptic scenario.
ColKG
I certianly think an attack on agriculture would be a way to hurt us, so it surely would be a plausible explanation for ACW2. I think its almost comforting to know that it would take incredible almost apocolyptic circumstances to get to a point like this though. In a food shortage situation, I think a good thing to look at might be Somalia, where the warlords were (are) stealing food from civilians and engaging in a massive genocidal civil war. While I don't think it would be quite as anarchistic here in the US, I still feel like it might be a place to look at ?
Delete"Y'all best stay out of the New Texican Republic. Just cause we got oil offshore and still manage to harvest our food from the sea don't mean were gonna share it with you Yankees. Don't believe me just ask them fellas that tried to move in from Oklahoma. Oh that's right you can't, cause their all dead." quote of Captain Richard Gonzales, commander of the Sam Houston Border Rangers.
ReplyDeleteyes. lol this is awesome
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