Some scenes come with the jolt of recognition. Troops I have seen amassed on the avenues of Washington – on the day of,when the nation’s capital looked more like Baghdad on the Potomac. Two weeks earlier,on,American battled American,as Trump’s army of supporters sought to overturn an election by ransacking Capitol Hill.
Not a movie,but National Guard troops in Washington DC at the inauguration of Joe Biden as president.AP
In this post-January 6 age of potentially catastrophic polarisation,when the instigator of that insurrection stands a good chance of returning to power,the question of whether the United States is headed towards Civil War 2.0 no longer feels hyperbolic.
One of the reasons I left America was because I could not envisage the country reaching a state of civil peace. But that is not the same thing as believing it will spiral into civil war. For all my pessimism about the future of a land I love so deeply,I still find it hard it to envisage a break-up of the union,and the kind of nationwide armed conflict depicted in Garland’s cinematic hellhole.
Even if the fissile state of politics feels more like the 1860s than the 1960s – the last time the country was such a powder keg – there are obvious. There is not the same north-south geographic divide. Though systemic racism in myriad forms persists,it does not have the same explosive power as enslavement. It is not just a single issue that divides the country,but a whole swathe,another point of difference with 1861.
Following January 6,fears of further domestic terror attacks causing mass bloodshed have not yet eventuated. Securing the convictions of more than 700 rioters and insurrectionists appears to have had the same dampening effect on militia activity as the crackdown in the aftermath of the Oklahoma City bomb attack in 1995. Seeing prominent militia figures,such as the Proud Boys’ former leader and the,convicted of seditious conspiracy has had a deterrent effect.
in the spring and summer of 2023 did not produce the “death and destruction” he predicted and seemingly hoped for. The response from his supporters was muted. When he called for a MAGA multitude to converge on the federal courthouse in Miami ahead of his arraignment in the classified documents case,only a hundred or so turned up. The police were prepared for 50,000. A guilty verdict in one of his criminal trials,and Trump’s possible imprisonment,could become another flashpoint,but the post-January 6 clampdown has unquestionably weakened the militia groups which idolise him.
If he,a Trump restoration would raise the spectre of regular showdowns with Democratic states,such as California and New York,and frequent stand-offs with protesters in the streets. The chief fear in these situations is not so much the prospect of violence from demonstrators but of a brutal crackdown by the president. Yet even then,a full-blown civil war would be by no means inevitable,partly because most liberal-minded Americans would be more likely to seek redress through the courts rather than armed resistance.
Perverse though it sounds,the dysfunction of the also serves as its own safety valve,not least the undemocratic features of its democracy. Imagine,for instance,if presidents were elected by popular vote,which would have given the Democrats a virtual lock on the White House for the past 30 years. Imagine the mood of insurrection in rural states awash with firearms if the make-up of the Senate did not give gun states such disproportionate power,and the ability to block gun control legislation.
Though it requires no great leap of the imagination to see sporadic militia violence becoming a more regular feature of American life,especially around flashpoints such as elections and polarising court cases,I find it harder to foresee even smaller scale versions of, or.
Besides,America has grown used over the centuries to coping with its divisiveness,just as a tropical country becomes proficient at dealing with suffocating heat. Alas,division has long been the default in a country increasingly defined by its disunion.
Nick Bryant,a former BBC Washington correspondent,is the author of the forthcoming bookThe Forever War:America’s Unending Conflict with Itself.