GWOT VII - American History Class
Mar. 5th, 2021 09:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
drewkittyGWOT VII - American History Class
If an American from a decade ago were somehow transported forward in time to the present, with no knowledge of the intervening events, that American would be utterly horrified. Yet again and again this happened in American history. Tell a native of the "Roaring '20s" of the Great Depression to come, or a WPA worker of the 1930s of the horrors just around the corner in World War II, or a 'vet' returning home from that war that the entire world would be at risk of being destroyed by the push of a button in less than twenty years...
The pre-Firecracker America had her tensions - the Cold War had ended, the War on Terror had taken its place, but Islamic fundamentalism was a weak menace at best. The military-industrial complex demanded its fuel; so did the prison-industrial complex, but unless you were a soldier or an inmate - or loved one - it was easy to overlook these machines run on human blood.
China was a known enemy, in some ways a staunch ally. The American consumer economy ran on cheap Chinese goods; the American financial economy, on Chinese money. The investment rules were oddly one-sided - money invested in America from overseas could be re-invested elsewhere, but all money invested in China had to stay in China. This meant enormous paper empires, Apple and Starbucks and Tesla and other western brands, but all the parent companies gained was cheap manufacturing and the occasional odd bit of intellectual property. The Chinese on the other hand made use - both openly and covertly - of every technology they could lay their hands on.
Militarily, it was a truism at least in the West, that only a fool would fight a land war in Asia. This meant that military planning surrounded seapower and airpower. A balance of edged blades, anti-shipping missiles versus Aegis missile interceptors. Or so the West thought, with a narrow focus that was from decade to decade.
In sober fact, China had been at war - for her freedom, for her national sovereignty, then for her very survival - since the barbarians had entered the Forbidden City over a century ago. Economics was war by other means; so was diplomacy. China hoped for cultural and economic hegemony, but if her survival was ever threatened, she was prepared to fight.
A decision was made, somewhere in the 'deep state' military-industrial bureaucracy, that China posed an intolerable threat to America. That a new enemy was needed - even though China and America had allied in their fight against Islamic extremism, even to the point of America discreetly ignoring what a previous generation would have called Uighur death camps.
An excuse was needed for the War. A Pearl Harbor tactic. What horrific act would galvanize Americans into supporting a war on China? And how would American fight such a War? It takes at least six weeks, if not six months, to make a soldier or a sailor - and China would mobilize faster, and cripple America's economy just by shutting down her own ports. If the world economic system did not crash first.
Enter the doomsday weapons. America, China and Russia had had a delicate balance of terror formed from nuclear arms and the presumed willingness and readiness to use them. The fear - the same fear California has today - was of a so-called 'decap' or decapitation strike. Cut off the head, destroy the national leadership, and perhaps the enemy''s retaliation would never launch.
All sides had bunkers. Russia had communications rockets, the Dead Hand system that would release nuclear codes to local commanders scattered across Earth's largest continent. America had the so-called Triad of nuclear arms - land-based missile silos, long range strike aircraft (and airborne command and control, amusingly named Looking Glass), and last but not least, the Trident nuclear submarine fleet. Lurking anywhere in the world's oceans, each Trident could be the death of a mid-sized nation - a couple dozen missiles, and more warheads.
China had no such capability. And America's 'deep state' war planners felt that they could shoot down any Chinese incoming, or reduce it to 'acceptable loss' levels - especially as the losses would be West Coast cities, never very powerful or important in American politics.
The inference was obvious. The decision was made - coldly, callously - to sacrifice an American city as the causus belli, the reason for war.
An American nuclear submarine was given verified but unusual orders. Near the California coast, she went to missile depth and launched, told that her targets were far to the west and south in the Pacific Missile Range.
Ninety seconds later, the missiles had gone east and detonated during boost phase. Sic transit Gloria mundi. San Francisco, the City Herself, as well as San Francisco International Airport with a second airburst.
We may never know the details. But we know that the crew of that American submarine shut down any further launches the only way they could - by manually igniting missiles in their tubes and incinerating their own vessel, with no hope of escape or survival.
Reconstructing the timing, with the help of world sensor networks and American defectors, we can now see that the 'retaliatory' launches were within minutes of San Francisco's destruction, according to an exceedingly detailed plan called War Plan Red.
War Plan Red was a decap strike on China. And it almost worked.
The guiding principle of the plan seems to have been to disarm China of her nuclear deterrent without regard to any other concerns. In nuclear war theory, now written horribly large as fact, a so-called 'counterforce' strike could take away an enemy's own nuclear capability while leaving the nation intact and her leaders alive to sue for peace.
This was not attempted. Many strikes destroyed cities. Partly this was because China had made no great effort to separate military bases from populated areas - China has some open spaces, but with a pre-War population of over one billion, they were always uninhabited for a reason. Partly this was from intended frightfulness; destroying dams and ports and airports would leave any survivors too busy trying to stay alive to fight back.
While the world's eyes were all on China, and the War, there was a quiet but intense crisis in the American government herself.
There were two factions - the faction that was horrified that the 'deep state' had started its own War, its own Reichstag Fire, and demanded that somehow what had been done must be undone; and the larger, more powerful faction that was willing to accept a fait accompli, embrace the War, and figure out little details like freedom and democracy once China was no longer a deadly threat.
The second faction won within days. Homeland was transformed from a relatively minor agency into a juggernaut of overwhelming illegal force. The first denizens of her camps were former government officials, many 'traitors' because they had accepted funds from China during peacetime. This was a ready excuse because Chinese lobbyists had bribed all American politicians at one time or another.
As the fabric of America changed from civilian clothing to military uniforms, the about-to-be-unemployed workers of the service economy were drafted. The potential rebels and problem cases were shoved to the front lines. Both the US Army and Homeland even used penal troops - the dreaded Special Troops were drafted from America's insane asylums and maximum security prisons, and set loose to wreak havoc in China.
One cherished fantasy of pre-War military analysts was immediately demolished. When national survival was at stake, there was no such thing as non-nuclear warfare.
China claimed innocence - she was in fact innocent - but found herself shattered. A third of her population dead or wounded, nearly every city wrecked, her armed forces scattered remnants of what had never been a very large force. "Good wood is not used for firewood; good men are not used for soldiers." And naval soldiers, sailors, were even lower than that in China's self-image.
But China has been shattered many times before in history. When America was a weak, upstart colony trying to defy British naval power, China had risen from the ashes many times.
The rest of the world was horrified to learn that good old Uncle Sam had turned out to be a mass murderer, a school shooter armed with nukes. The UN imposed blockade. The British Royal Navy asserted and protected the independence of Hong Kong. Even once-staunch allies like Japan and Canada expelled American troops where they could, pointedly militarized and prepared in great fear for what they assumed would be their turn to be crushed under the American juggernaut.
China desperately bought time. Handfuls of American troops would fight much larger but weaker Chinese forces. An American soldier might be worth ten Chinese, especially when the latter were armed with bows or even rocks, but there was always an eleventh.
Pre-War estimates of Chinese naval power were wrong by an order of magnitude. The Chinese had not only ballistic but hypersonic missiles, all nuclear-capable, and both the willingness to release control to local commanders as well as the ruthlessness to try to use them freely. Over one hundred nuclear launches against the American mainland were attempted; none got through; but two American carrier groups were 'nuked' and a third badly damaged.
Revenge, however, would have to wait. But if nothing else, the Chinese are patient.
Less than a year later, ballistic missile tracks appeared from the center of the Great Lakes between America and China. It could hardly be called a sneak attack; America had literally run out of nuclear ordinance, except for that deployed on Trident submarines, and was having trouble making more even with the Pentax factory in Texas working around the clock.
A Chinese nuclear ballistic missile submarine had been shipped inside a merchant freighter.
Now the cities destroyed were American. Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit. America's heart lands.
The enraged American leadership wanted to blame anyone but themselves, and threatened war with Canada.
Canada surrendered at once. But America's ancient friend England had had enough.
A letter was delivered by diplomatic courier to the American President - actually a puppet of the 'deep state', though few knew it and even fewer cared.
The contents were unequivocal. Back down, or the world united will destroy America.
Two powers also had ballistic missile submarines - Britain and France. The British submarines had been discounted as a factor, as the necessary maintenance for their nuclear warheads was no longer being provided by the US Navy. The French had been discounted - 'cheese eating surrender monkeys' - but monkeys in arms. And the French had serviced the British warheads.
Now the threat was visceral. Washington DC, New York...
And for the second time as many years, there was another quiet internal revolution in the American bureaucracy.
Homeland was 'de-emphasized' and many of its troops sent to China. Those forces forward deployed were told to go on the defensive, hold what they had gained, and start following the laws of war with respect to Chinese civilians under their control. And put them to work - you will need to support yourselves on local resources soon.
Revolutions do not take place when governments are strong. They take place when governments are weak.
Six American states - those who had borne the brunt of the War, and the worst excesses of Homeland - had had enough. Texas was one - and America could no longer manufacture or maintain nuclear arms.
The Second American Civil War was on.
California fought for her freedom, and won it on many battlefields - the cities, the Sierras, the deserts, in the Pacific and in space. But the two battlefields that mattered most were the production line and the United Nations General Assembly.
California manufactured nuclear arms. And had the willingness to use them.
At the UN General Assembly, California asserted her freedom. It was clear that America could still destroy her. But California made it clear that that destruction would come at a fearful price.
Never before had any nation brought a demonstratably operational nuclear weapon literally into the halls of the United Nations.
America shifted gears at home. Switching to defense now that offense was something she could no longer afford. Her forces in China were cut loose to fend for themselves.
Yet America still had Trident. Still had the ability to destroy the world. A world in arms against America could still be killed.
America is now getting ready to hold her first Presidental election in eight years, having skipped one during the War. There are five parties, not two - Republican, Peace and Freedom, Democrat, Constitutionalist and Unity. By far the strongest two are Peace and Freedom, versus Unity.
Regardless of the outcome of this election, the 'deep state' will continue to be in charge of America. It is clear that elections inform but do not control it. And unlike the leadership of other nations, the unelected bureaucrats of the deep state are difficult to depose, or even to kill, because they cannot easily be identified. This also makes it difficult to negotiate with them. This is why the Talks continue but hae gone nowhere, and likely will never go anywhere.
Each of the 'Six Sinners' has now held a plebicite election to explore reunification with America. California, Arizona and Nevada overwhelmingly rejected it. Texas and Washington were more equivocal. Oregon is slightly in favor. But only Utah has returned to the fold, and is the strongest supporter of the Constitutionalist Party.
We are far from 'the end of history.' It was feared during the Cold War with good reason, that any use of nuclear arms might be the last, that the 'story of humanity might be that of apes playing with matches on a gasoline dump.' Now we have lit our matches, singed ourselves - sometimes badly - but we have survived so far. The spectre of Mutual Assured Destruction is still with us. There are more Doomsday weapons than ever and even the smallest countries now race to have something to hold between them and annihilation. As long as America continues to have her Tridents and her millions, she will still be the most powerful country on the planet, and a threat to her survival risks the annihilation of the entity making that threat.
This ends the study of American history in this unit. Next is the study of Californian history from the Native Peoples, through the Conquistadors and Mexican ranchos, to the American invasion in 1848 and the Eastern colonization period...
If an American from a decade ago were somehow transported forward in time to the present, with no knowledge of the intervening events, that American would be utterly horrified. Yet again and again this happened in American history. Tell a native of the "Roaring '20s" of the Great Depression to come, or a WPA worker of the 1930s of the horrors just around the corner in World War II, or a 'vet' returning home from that war that the entire world would be at risk of being destroyed by the push of a button in less than twenty years...
The pre-Firecracker America had her tensions - the Cold War had ended, the War on Terror had taken its place, but Islamic fundamentalism was a weak menace at best. The military-industrial complex demanded its fuel; so did the prison-industrial complex, but unless you were a soldier or an inmate - or loved one - it was easy to overlook these machines run on human blood.
China was a known enemy, in some ways a staunch ally. The American consumer economy ran on cheap Chinese goods; the American financial economy, on Chinese money. The investment rules were oddly one-sided - money invested in America from overseas could be re-invested elsewhere, but all money invested in China had to stay in China. This meant enormous paper empires, Apple and Starbucks and Tesla and other western brands, but all the parent companies gained was cheap manufacturing and the occasional odd bit of intellectual property. The Chinese on the other hand made use - both openly and covertly - of every technology they could lay their hands on.
Militarily, it was a truism at least in the West, that only a fool would fight a land war in Asia. This meant that military planning surrounded seapower and airpower. A balance of edged blades, anti-shipping missiles versus Aegis missile interceptors. Or so the West thought, with a narrow focus that was from decade to decade.
In sober fact, China had been at war - for her freedom, for her national sovereignty, then for her very survival - since the barbarians had entered the Forbidden City over a century ago. Economics was war by other means; so was diplomacy. China hoped for cultural and economic hegemony, but if her survival was ever threatened, she was prepared to fight.
A decision was made, somewhere in the 'deep state' military-industrial bureaucracy, that China posed an intolerable threat to America. That a new enemy was needed - even though China and America had allied in their fight against Islamic extremism, even to the point of America discreetly ignoring what a previous generation would have called Uighur death camps.
An excuse was needed for the War. A Pearl Harbor tactic. What horrific act would galvanize Americans into supporting a war on China? And how would American fight such a War? It takes at least six weeks, if not six months, to make a soldier or a sailor - and China would mobilize faster, and cripple America's economy just by shutting down her own ports. If the world economic system did not crash first.
Enter the doomsday weapons. America, China and Russia had had a delicate balance of terror formed from nuclear arms and the presumed willingness and readiness to use them. The fear - the same fear California has today - was of a so-called 'decap' or decapitation strike. Cut off the head, destroy the national leadership, and perhaps the enemy''s retaliation would never launch.
All sides had bunkers. Russia had communications rockets, the Dead Hand system that would release nuclear codes to local commanders scattered across Earth's largest continent. America had the so-called Triad of nuclear arms - land-based missile silos, long range strike aircraft (and airborne command and control, amusingly named Looking Glass), and last but not least, the Trident nuclear submarine fleet. Lurking anywhere in the world's oceans, each Trident could be the death of a mid-sized nation - a couple dozen missiles, and more warheads.
China had no such capability. And America's 'deep state' war planners felt that they could shoot down any Chinese incoming, or reduce it to 'acceptable loss' levels - especially as the losses would be West Coast cities, never very powerful or important in American politics.
The inference was obvious. The decision was made - coldly, callously - to sacrifice an American city as the causus belli, the reason for war.
An American nuclear submarine was given verified but unusual orders. Near the California coast, she went to missile depth and launched, told that her targets were far to the west and south in the Pacific Missile Range.
Ninety seconds later, the missiles had gone east and detonated during boost phase. Sic transit Gloria mundi. San Francisco, the City Herself, as well as San Francisco International Airport with a second airburst.
We may never know the details. But we know that the crew of that American submarine shut down any further launches the only way they could - by manually igniting missiles in their tubes and incinerating their own vessel, with no hope of escape or survival.
Reconstructing the timing, with the help of world sensor networks and American defectors, we can now see that the 'retaliatory' launches were within minutes of San Francisco's destruction, according to an exceedingly detailed plan called War Plan Red.
War Plan Red was a decap strike on China. And it almost worked.
The guiding principle of the plan seems to have been to disarm China of her nuclear deterrent without regard to any other concerns. In nuclear war theory, now written horribly large as fact, a so-called 'counterforce' strike could take away an enemy's own nuclear capability while leaving the nation intact and her leaders alive to sue for peace.
This was not attempted. Many strikes destroyed cities. Partly this was because China had made no great effort to separate military bases from populated areas - China has some open spaces, but with a pre-War population of over one billion, they were always uninhabited for a reason. Partly this was from intended frightfulness; destroying dams and ports and airports would leave any survivors too busy trying to stay alive to fight back.
While the world's eyes were all on China, and the War, there was a quiet but intense crisis in the American government herself.
There were two factions - the faction that was horrified that the 'deep state' had started its own War, its own Reichstag Fire, and demanded that somehow what had been done must be undone; and the larger, more powerful faction that was willing to accept a fait accompli, embrace the War, and figure out little details like freedom and democracy once China was no longer a deadly threat.
The second faction won within days. Homeland was transformed from a relatively minor agency into a juggernaut of overwhelming illegal force. The first denizens of her camps were former government officials, many 'traitors' because they had accepted funds from China during peacetime. This was a ready excuse because Chinese lobbyists had bribed all American politicians at one time or another.
As the fabric of America changed from civilian clothing to military uniforms, the about-to-be-unemployed workers of the service economy were drafted. The potential rebels and problem cases were shoved to the front lines. Both the US Army and Homeland even used penal troops - the dreaded Special Troops were drafted from America's insane asylums and maximum security prisons, and set loose to wreak havoc in China.
One cherished fantasy of pre-War military analysts was immediately demolished. When national survival was at stake, there was no such thing as non-nuclear warfare.
China claimed innocence - she was in fact innocent - but found herself shattered. A third of her population dead or wounded, nearly every city wrecked, her armed forces scattered remnants of what had never been a very large force. "Good wood is not used for firewood; good men are not used for soldiers." And naval soldiers, sailors, were even lower than that in China's self-image.
But China has been shattered many times before in history. When America was a weak, upstart colony trying to defy British naval power, China had risen from the ashes many times.
The rest of the world was horrified to learn that good old Uncle Sam had turned out to be a mass murderer, a school shooter armed with nukes. The UN imposed blockade. The British Royal Navy asserted and protected the independence of Hong Kong. Even once-staunch allies like Japan and Canada expelled American troops where they could, pointedly militarized and prepared in great fear for what they assumed would be their turn to be crushed under the American juggernaut.
China desperately bought time. Handfuls of American troops would fight much larger but weaker Chinese forces. An American soldier might be worth ten Chinese, especially when the latter were armed with bows or even rocks, but there was always an eleventh.
Pre-War estimates of Chinese naval power were wrong by an order of magnitude. The Chinese had not only ballistic but hypersonic missiles, all nuclear-capable, and both the willingness to release control to local commanders as well as the ruthlessness to try to use them freely. Over one hundred nuclear launches against the American mainland were attempted; none got through; but two American carrier groups were 'nuked' and a third badly damaged.
Revenge, however, would have to wait. But if nothing else, the Chinese are patient.
Less than a year later, ballistic missile tracks appeared from the center of the Great Lakes between America and China. It could hardly be called a sneak attack; America had literally run out of nuclear ordinance, except for that deployed on Trident submarines, and was having trouble making more even with the Pentax factory in Texas working around the clock.
A Chinese nuclear ballistic missile submarine had been shipped inside a merchant freighter.
Now the cities destroyed were American. Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit. America's heart lands.
The enraged American leadership wanted to blame anyone but themselves, and threatened war with Canada.
Canada surrendered at once. But America's ancient friend England had had enough.
A letter was delivered by diplomatic courier to the American President - actually a puppet of the 'deep state', though few knew it and even fewer cared.
The contents were unequivocal. Back down, or the world united will destroy America.
Two powers also had ballistic missile submarines - Britain and France. The British submarines had been discounted as a factor, as the necessary maintenance for their nuclear warheads was no longer being provided by the US Navy. The French had been discounted - 'cheese eating surrender monkeys' - but monkeys in arms. And the French had serviced the British warheads.
Now the threat was visceral. Washington DC, New York...
And for the second time as many years, there was another quiet internal revolution in the American bureaucracy.
Homeland was 'de-emphasized' and many of its troops sent to China. Those forces forward deployed were told to go on the defensive, hold what they had gained, and start following the laws of war with respect to Chinese civilians under their control. And put them to work - you will need to support yourselves on local resources soon.
Revolutions do not take place when governments are strong. They take place when governments are weak.
Six American states - those who had borne the brunt of the War, and the worst excesses of Homeland - had had enough. Texas was one - and America could no longer manufacture or maintain nuclear arms.
The Second American Civil War was on.
California fought for her freedom, and won it on many battlefields - the cities, the Sierras, the deserts, in the Pacific and in space. But the two battlefields that mattered most were the production line and the United Nations General Assembly.
California manufactured nuclear arms. And had the willingness to use them.
At the UN General Assembly, California asserted her freedom. It was clear that America could still destroy her. But California made it clear that that destruction would come at a fearful price.
Never before had any nation brought a demonstratably operational nuclear weapon literally into the halls of the United Nations.
America shifted gears at home. Switching to defense now that offense was something she could no longer afford. Her forces in China were cut loose to fend for themselves.
Yet America still had Trident. Still had the ability to destroy the world. A world in arms against America could still be killed.
America is now getting ready to hold her first Presidental election in eight years, having skipped one during the War. There are five parties, not two - Republican, Peace and Freedom, Democrat, Constitutionalist and Unity. By far the strongest two are Peace and Freedom, versus Unity.
Regardless of the outcome of this election, the 'deep state' will continue to be in charge of America. It is clear that elections inform but do not control it. And unlike the leadership of other nations, the unelected bureaucrats of the deep state are difficult to depose, or even to kill, because they cannot easily be identified. This also makes it difficult to negotiate with them. This is why the Talks continue but hae gone nowhere, and likely will never go anywhere.
Each of the 'Six Sinners' has now held a plebicite election to explore reunification with America. California, Arizona and Nevada overwhelmingly rejected it. Texas and Washington were more equivocal. Oregon is slightly in favor. But only Utah has returned to the fold, and is the strongest supporter of the Constitutionalist Party.
We are far from 'the end of history.' It was feared during the Cold War with good reason, that any use of nuclear arms might be the last, that the 'story of humanity might be that of apes playing with matches on a gasoline dump.' Now we have lit our matches, singed ourselves - sometimes badly - but we have survived so far. The spectre of Mutual Assured Destruction is still with us. There are more Doomsday weapons than ever and even the smallest countries now race to have something to hold between them and annihilation. As long as America continues to have her Tridents and her millions, she will still be the most powerful country on the planet, and a threat to her survival risks the annihilation of the entity making that threat.
This ends the study of American history in this unit. Next is the study of Californian history from the Native Peoples, through the Conquistadors and Mexican ranchos, to the American invasion in 1848 and the Eastern colonization period...
