So you’re relying on the fact that the soldiers who you’ve been blowing up and shooting at will want to join your side? That’s a massive ‘if’, and if you’re relying on them joining you and bringing their equipment with them, doesn’t this make the second amendment a moot point?
Also, what makes you think that the entire citizenry would be on your side? Lets take the example of the War of Independence, which was also essentially a civil war between loyalists on the side of the government and the rebels.
The technology available at the time meant that a rebel force could equip itself to something approaching an equal standard to government forces, in the case of rifles, even better, and was capable of defeating a government force conventionally in the field in the right circumstances. Even then though, without French assistence, especially naval support, the rebels had next to no chance of actually being able to trap and destroy a government army and thus bring the war to an end.
This was less the case during the American civil war, but in that case, the rebels still put up a good fight before the superior equipment available to the Union told against them.
Nowadays though, the disparity is huge. It may have been feasible a couple of centuries ago for a citizen’s militia to get some horses and cannons, but getting tanks and helicopters/jet fighters etc is just not feasible.
Sure, a rebel force may be able to inflict a few casualties like they are in Afghanistan, but the casualties are going to be a lot greater on your side, and as for any dreams of defeating a government army in the field and driving it away so you can storm Washington DC and overthrow the government, forget it. Not going to happen. Best you can hope for is to survive for a long time until everybody gets sick of fighting and the government is prepared to make a few token concessions to you to allow you to keep some of your pride intact as you surrender yourselves and go back to a peace were it is unlikely you will have achieved anything meaningful for your efforts...
You really don’t know what you’re talking about.
They will just use foreign troops and significantly reduce the size of the US military should an internal rebellion become a threat. This is to prevent a coup attempt and/or mass desertion.
The first block lives in cities and survives in large part off government hand-outs. These people do not grow food, do not manufacture anything, cannot fix anything, in many cases cannot drive a car, and mostly do not own guns.
The second block lives outside cities, grows food, makes stuff, fixes stuff, owns a variety of vehicles, and often owns many weapons, some of considerable firepower.
The first thing to know is that the population in the first block begins to die off very quickly if the second block decides to stop sending them food and supplies. Riots in the cities will hasten this die-off. The second thing to realize is that a tyrannical government (like all governments) is supported by taxes levied against the producing class. Well, the producing class just stopped paying. The third thing to know is that the supporters of a tyrannical government are supporters largely because the government gives them goodies. Well, the goodies just stopped coming because the tax revenues just dried up. So support for the tyranny is on a constant downward slope.
There wouldn’t be any real pitched battles. There’s no point to any sweeping envelopment by armored divisions. What are you going to envelop? The Midwest?? No. The war ends quickly because the government and its supporters cannot function without active, constant support from the producing class. Any gleanings that may provide subsistence to the tyrants can be interdicted through simple guerrilla tactics by any of about 100 million good old boys who like to have a little fun and watch things blow up.
In a backward country like Afghanistan, low-level fighting can go on for a long time because (usually) both sides have little, require little, and are willing to get by with whatever comes to hand. The US simply isn't like that. The government of the US is an extremely high-maintenance machine. Care and feeding of that beast requires huge resources. Disrupt the flow, push the government toward the status of a backward nation, and the only supporters left will have names like Kennedy and Clinton. Everyone else will have jumped ship.