A Marine explains which state would win if the US declared war on itself

business insider ^ | Jul. 27, 2015, 11:15 PM | Jon Davis, Quora

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

We recently came across the following question on Quora: "If every state of the USA declared war against each other, which would win?" We've published the full answer from Quora user Jon Davis, a Marine veteran who is now a writer and blogger on military, veterans, and Middle Eastern affairs. In Oct. 2014, Davis' answer was optioned by a Hollywood producer for a potential television series.

These are the accounts of the Second American Civil War, also known as the Wars of Reunification and the American Warring States Period.

[Rebelbase]

An irritating inconsistency:

Catching fireflies and seeing the EMP event followed by:

"I don't know,Sweetie. We need to get back into the house before it gets too cold."

[Vermont Lt]

Nope. Four years was enough there.

[Dr. Sivana]

Most calories would be coming from grains. Where the Midwest shines (corn, wheat, soy). We lived in rural Illinois, and zucchini will grow there just by looking at it. The northeast is also okay for blueberries, though my present state of Georgia grows more blueberries than either Maine or Michigan. Upstate NY Niagara region is of course known for grapes. These aren’t staple crops for a large population.

[SgtHooper]

Not only that, but the border states would need to contend with illegal aliens fighting in from the southern border.

[SgtHooper]

The rural vs urban tension is more about small towns against large cities, rather than rural (i.e. farming) against (farming illiterate) city dwellers.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

The gangs in the big cities?

If so they are doing a very poor job of it.

Oh sure, they shoot at each other but they never bother to actually AIM. They kill far more people who are not members of any gang then they do rival gangs.

[SgtHooper]

The nukes are essentially useless, unless a true invasion occurs from a major power. Nuking a place you intend to eventually control is insanity, unless you never intend to enter the area for a few thousand years. Now, nuking the southern border, I can see. Run a Plowshares Program the length of the border using small nukes.

[SgtHooper]

Could be a real problem. There would be high-speed mass migration of the snowflakes heading your direction. Then whattaya gonna do?

[Alas Babylon!]

What’s the problem, son?

Just who are the invaders?

Who lived here 500 years ago?

How about the Northeast and Midwest?

How did New York get so Italian and Jewish when it used to be German and Irish?

How did Yankee Boston get Irish?

How did South Chicago get black? Or Watts? Or Detroit? Philadelphia?

Sure, people move...

Are you claiming that I believe every single person in the South directly descends from Robert E. Lee and General Jackson? LOL! Because such a claim is what’s delusional.

My definition of a Southerner: Some who lives in the one of the following states:

Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. Texas straddles between Southern and Southwestern.

If you think I want to see the rise of the Confederacy then you are mistaken. However, I was only addressing the OP’s claim that the South is full of gangbangers and meth smoking rednecks. It ain’t.

Just like New Yorkers can be proud of the smack talkin’ but kind hearted Italian from the Bronx, Southerners tend to be proud of good ole boys. Even when in almost any case, none of them are.

[Cowgirl of Justice]

I just think of Ca as a bunch of passive tree huggers who let criminals run roughshod over them, waiting for someone else to put out the effort and let everyone else pay for it.

[Alas Babylon!]

OK. Where I live (Alabama) folks are much more monolithic. Whites vote Conservative mostly, blacks democrat. I’m unhappy about the racial divide but what can I do?

I do agree with you that IF there was total chaos, sSurvival would be job one.

I think the joining together happens long after the dust settles.

And the South will be one part, the Northeast another, etc.

I would HOPE that the survivors would be nostalgic for our current times, and strive to recreate it.

But that would be after all the Mad Max wore off.

But the whole thing is crazy speculation, after all, for whatever either of us thinks, no?

The whole point was based on the question of what would happen if each state became a separate country. Now as silly and as unlikely as that is, I still suspect many people in many states would not want to be in separate countries, but joined together somehow.

The original question never said they’d immediately be in some apocalypse at first, but would get that way because they’d be at each other’s throats...

[Forward the Light Brigade]

Watts in LA is now Latino, Martin Luther King Hospital is surrounded by a Latino Barrio. Things change.

[daniel1212]

Federal government has made states so dependent upon them that secession seems untenable.

Explain that?

Let me say that i am sympathetic to the idea of secession of conservative states on moral grounds yet from what i have read it "seems untenable." At least unless the people are willing to pay the price of it. Much has been written on this, such as argue that states overall - and the persons in them - are very pretty dependent upon the Federal government, from interstate construction to Social Security and Medicaid and Medicare, and such like.

While not paying taxes to the Fed would save money, yet federal funds make up a greater portion of the state's revenue of Red States, and taking over the costs of what the feds funds would be difficult.

And that federal funds make up a greater portion of the state's revenue of Red States

https://www.cato.org/blog/how-much-does-state-government-depend-federal-funds

Louisiana and Mississippi are generally among the top recipients in federal aid year after year. That was true again in 2015: Federal intergovernmental revenues accounted for about 42 percent of their general fund revenues, the top shares nationally. Other states whose budgets are most dependent on the feds include Arizona (40 percent), Kentucky (40 percent), New Mexico (39 percent), Montana (39 percent) and Oregon (39 percent). That’s roughly twice as much as the least-reliant state budgets, which include North Dakota (18 percent) and Virginia (22 percent).

Public welfare is the single largest source of federal funding, primarily driven by Medicaid costs. Federal aid made up nearly two-thirds (64 percent) of states’ public welfare general expenditures, according to the survey data. The share was highest -- more than 90 percent -- in New Mexico and Ohio.

Federal aid made up for more than half of what the Census categorizes as “highway” spending in eight states, led by Rhode Island and Wyoming. Meanwhile, it made up roughly one-fifth of spending in Massachusetts and Minnesota. Most of this funding comes from the Federal Highway Trust Fund. It doesn’t include grants related to transit systems. - http://www.governing.com/topics/finance/gov-state-budgets-federal-funding-2015-2018-trump.html

Only 11 states depended on the federal government for more than one-third of their total revenues in 2001. By 2012, 24 states found themselves in this situation. State-by-state data from the U.S. Census Bureau, compiled by the State Budget Solutions nonprofit, illustrates the trend of increasing state dependence on federal financial assistance. Forty-one of the 50 states have become more dependent on the federal government since 2001 — with federal dollars accounting for an increasing share of their total revenues. - https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/exography-state-government-dependence-on-federal-funding-growing-at-alarming-rate

Of course, Fiscal Federalism should not be the case .

A black friend who grew up "poor" in Alabama about 50 years ago relates that they shared what they had - including spanking disrespectful kids (no sassing back), and "had everything but money."

Of course, then there is the need for national defense and projects (like the space program) that are beyond what must states can engage in by themselves.

And a independent state would also have to create their own currency and form trade relations, face disruption in critical interstate commerce and , the economic loss of US military base closures and federal employees and the closing of USPS offices. And perhaps denial of the National Guard. Plus demand by the Fed for compensation for the of land formerly operated by the US. However, I am only providing some practical reasons why secession "seems" untenable, but i again, i am sympathetic to the idea of secession and you are welcome to give input in support of it.

[Alas Babylon!]

Good point. In the Northeast, same thing happened after each wave of immigration, and then the blacks moving North (out the South) in the 1920s-40s, and now this new wave of illegal and Ted Kennedy created third world immigration.

Still, the idea that somehow you could make the 50 states republics overnight, without any bad times, events or warfare is in itself a foolish question to base an answer to.

That’s what most everyone (even I) on this thread is missing.

Instead they want to make it about a political or cultural divide that suddenly metastasizes into chaos...

We could have a THOUSAND threads on that alone!

[HotHunt]

What am "I" going to do?

What are YOU going to do?

[HotHunt]

Of course, it's only ME that couldn't be more wrong.

You're apparently exempt from have the "wrong" opinion.

Have fun sitting in your garage with your rifle protecting an inanimate object.

[Billthedrill]

Idaho would win. Everyone trying to invade would end up either in Toledo or Des Moines.

Yes, the premise is a little silly. As several have pointed out, the political divide in this country doesn't break down to state borders, it breaks down to that red-vs-blue distribution seen on the last election maps. And the vast, vast majority of Americans simply wish to be left alone anyway.

Or at least so I hope. I don't know how in the world we'd burn the potato fields in advance of an invading army. Suckers are impossible to keep lit.

[central_va]

While not paying taxes to the Fed would save money, yet federal funds make up a greater portion of the state's revenue of Red States, and taking over the costs of what the feds funds would be difficult

You could have stopped right there. The fault with that is thinking that a seceding state, group of states would no longer require its citizens to pay federal taxes. Why would you think that?

[Drew68]

Have fun sitting in your garage with your rifle protecting an inanimate object.

A gas-powered generator, in a time of war, is just an "inanimate object"?

You're not really much of a deep thinker, are you?

[HotHunt]

Don't be so quick to flatter yourself, bucko.

I don't have to be much of a deep thinker when I'm against that inanimate object in your skull.

Time To Say Goodbye

Enjoy.