State's Actions

April 9, 2024 12:07 PM

With the release of the movie, "Civil War", I have to wonder if, since the first civil war, states have had plans or considerations to protect themselves against other states in case of a second civil war? I can't believe this isn't something the RAND Corporation hasn't studied for the federal government.
posted by CollectiveMind to Law & Government (11 answers total)

I think the answer is no, but who knows. RAND, the NSA, etc. may well have drafted contingency plans at the federal level to deal with a significant insurrection, especially since Jan. 6, 2021. But it would be a whole other thing for states to make contingency plans "against other states" in case of a civil war. If such plans exist they would be secret, because if they were not secret, they would have been headlined all over the media ("Vermont plans to block all bridges to New Hampshire in case of civil war"). No hint of that has happened, in any state. And probably it would be illegal make such plans, though I'm no expert on what the basis for that might be (maybe under the Supreme Court decisions outlined here, which say that states have made "a complete delegation of authority to the Federal Government to provide for the common defense."
posted by beagle at 1:26 PM on April 9

States can constitutionally take actions to repel actual invasion, probably? This is from Article 1, section 10 of the Constitution:

No State shall, without the Consent of Congress... engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.

If they can delay, they have to let the federal government to deal with it. If their neighbor state sent a militia over the border they could probably deploy their state guard to try to fend them off in the very short term?
posted by BungaDunga at 2:58 PM on April 9 [1 favorite]

I doubt there's very much wargaming of military conflict between states. On the other hand, there are all sorts of battles going on between states, and between states and the federal government. For example, with the recent Supreme Court actions taken against women's health care, a number of states have passed shield laws, seeking to protect their citizens from legal action by other states.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 4:39 PM on April 9

I've more confidence that both defensive and offensive plans exist for such invasions than I do that these plans could be effectively executed. While far from perfect parallels, a few states tried to regulate interstate travel during COVID and completely failed (roadblocks are quite easily worked around in an era of private planes and all terrain vehicles and side roads) And the failure of Texas military and police authorities to effectively assist with border issues, even with federal aid or even for those within their realm such as drug control or human trafficking. Also the state national guard are not full time militia; guardsmen generally rotate short term service periods which leads to incredible training issues.
posted by beaning at 6:43 PM on April 9

And back to the core question of if one state attacking another has been wargamed, I would think yes. Texas's recurring notions of seceding have likely led to some type of planning effort by interested parties.
posted by beaning at 6:52 PM on April 9

When my sister-in-law was training in the Air National Guard one of the exercises was practicing in-flight codebook switches. The scenario they used was that California had declared independence while the National Guard flight was in the air.

It was a well worn exercise, everyone knew what was coming, and also her flight crew was from California so they made some arrangements and when the orders came they pulled out an alternative set of codebooks and defected.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:21 PM on April 9 [8 favorites]

(My point being that people in the military are aware of these scenarios and at least engage with them in a playful fashion. I don’t know how seriously any given state guard has taken them).
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:39 PM on April 9

In a civil war scenario, the federal government would be extremely motivated to defend the non-seceding states. So in a practical sense I don’t see much reason for states to develop their own defenses for that specific scenario, except maybe as an emergency holdover measure for a few days while waiting for federal assistance.

That’s not to say that some of the less-government-trusting states haven’t considered it, though.
posted by mekily at 8:48 PM on April 9

Do states have plans? I doubt it.

But it might be interesting to look into whether the DC/Northern Virginia area has new civil war defense plans. Because I bet the federal government there does, based on its location.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:20 AM on April 10

In a civil war scenario, the federal government would be extremely motivated to defend the non-seceding states. So in a practical sense I don’t see much reason for states to develop their own defenses for that specific scenario, except maybe as an emergency holdover measure for a few days while waiting for federal assistance.

That ignores the states that believe they will be the ones seceding.

States have a lot of control of where bases and armories are placed. It would not surprise me if some strategic thought was put into those, to cover the case when the Federal government takes full control of a neighboring state’s National guard units and has them invade.

Wars are often won decades in advance, and this is the kind of thing a military that takes the long view would consider, particularly in states that have been invaded before.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 7:10 AM on April 10

A friend who was in the Washington National Guard said that they gamed out some scenarios like neighboring states invading, and I would be utterly shocked if all of the various National Guards haven't wargamed setups that could be easily repurposed to reacting to neighboring state invasions.

Militaries game out all sorts of possibilities, if only because considering "what if our current friendlies aren't?" might help see blind spots that don't show up when you stay stuck in your prejudices about who your enemies are.

I mean, heck, California already has border crossing checkpoints.
posted by straw at 8:23 AM on April 10