Andrew Busch has an important article at The American Mind (h/t Instapundit) that examines how close we are to secession and/or civil war. His starting point is the recent 2020 election wargame run by the Democrats. Most of the scenarios involved Trump losing the election, but refusing to leave office. But the one that concerns us--and that I've mentioned before--was a repeat of 2016 with Trump losing the popular vote but winning in the Electoral Collage.
John Podesta of Pizza Gate fame played the role of the Biden Campaign and, rather than conceding defeat, instead sought to undermine the election in two ways. First, he encouraged the Democratic governors of states that voted for Trump to disobey the will of the voters and send electors that would vote for Biden. This resulted in Biden being selected as president by the House, but the Senate not recognizing Biden's victory. Second, he convinced the Left Coast governors of California, Oregon and Washington to threaten secession unless Trump (and Congress) gave into to certain demands including: abolishing the Electoral College, stacking the Senate by means of granting statehood to the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico and splitting California into five states, and putting an age limit of 70 on Supreme Court justices. In the wargame, the crises was not averted before January 21, 2021, when a new president is supposed to take office, which resulted in the military being left to choose which of two conflicting presidents they would follow.
If you think this is far-fetched, Busch disagrees. He notes, for instance, that "John Podesta is not a weird outlier; he is a Democratic heavy hitter attuned to the sentiments of his party’s upper echelons." Also, and just as important, the United States has had contested elections before in 1800, 1860 and 1876. In 1800, the Federalist party threatened armed revolt which was avoided when Hamilton convinced a senator to support the Federalist candidate, Thomas Jefferson. In 1876, the crises was resolved by Congress granting concessions to Southern Democrats, including the removal of troops from the Southern States and, thus, ushering in Jim Crow. In 1860, notwithstanding an offer to amend the Constitution to guarantee the right of slavery, the Democrats decided on secession with the resulting civil war.
Busch continues:
What would come after the Podesta Gambit was not explored in the simulation, which ended on January 20, 2021. But anyone who took such steps in real life would be playing with a very large fire indeed. Consider these questions:
What if the political leadership of the country bows to the west coast? It is not at all clear that portions of the center of the country would not then threaten secession themselves. On what principled basis could it be opposed? At the least, our federal system of presidential elections would be replaced with a unitary system deliberately designed to drown out voices from the middle, making it more likely that a split from the middle will take place someday.
On the other hand, what if Republicans shock San Francisco, Portland, and Seattle by not bowing to threats but rather saying “good riddance—don’t let the door hit you on the way out”? Some Republicans might calculate that their national position would improve markedly if we were to allow the western seaboard to saw itself off and float out to the Pacific, as Barry Goldwater might have said.
But who thinks the passion for separation, once uncorked, would end there? Other deep blue states would surely follow, and the country would shatter. And the shattering would be messy. Even deep blue or deep red states contain within their borders sizeable minorities of the opposition. In 1860, Lincoln had his strongest Southern showing in Virginia, where he won 1.3% of the vote. In 2016, Trump won 1/3 of the vote even in New York, California, Illinois, and Massachusetts, a proportion that translates to millions of people caught behind the lines.
Then there is the possibility that federal authorities would use force to suppress secession or that violence would spontaneously erupt. Missouri, a closely divided state featuring bloody guerrilla warfare, was an outlier in 1860. If the country splits and things turn violent today, there will be many Missouris. Moreover, in most of the country, the barbarity of the Civil War was mitigated by the predominant use of regular armies following the laws of war, and by the common moral and religious underpinnings of the combatants. A modern version would look more like Bosnia than Gettysburg.
If we were lucky, things would not devolve into open war. But terrible consequences would still follow. There would be millions of refugees flowing in both directions, though more out of the blue zones, which will be afflicted by Portland-style disorder or insufferable progressive power unconstrained by the Bill of Rights. Continental commerce would be interrupted and basic security endangered.
The west coast would reach for international allies, and we might eventually find Chinese troops on North American soil. All of the reasons for union recited in Federalist #1-10 would come back to haunt us. And there would be other difficult issues to resolve, such as how to divide the national debt and the nation’s nuclear arsenal.
One might object that all of this is unlikely, and perhaps it is. But it no longer seems impossible. We have already seen things in 2020 that most would have deemed impossible last New Year’s Eve.
Busch offers suggestions on how to stave off a post-election crises, but it would involve the major players committing to taking off the table a contested election, sending substitute electors to Washington, and secession. I don't see that happening because it would require the Democrats to voluntarily give up leverage.
Busch is only looking at the repercussions at home. But if the United States sneezes, the rest of the world catches a cold. Former Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Michael Morell and ex-Admiral James Winnefeld have published an essay that suggests that China would take advantage of domestic problems surrounding the election in the United States to invade Taiwan.
At this time the West is distracted by the U.S. election and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The authors believe the "operation" will be completed in just three days.
Morell and Winnefeld paint a worst-case scenario in the article.... They assume the operation will unfold quickly, "beginning on the evening of 18 January," prior to the U.S. presidential inauguration.
At the same time, China will carry out cyber attacks to cripple the country [Taiwan] by disabling the national power grid and other important utilities. This will be followed by a swift sea and air blockade, with several Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) submarines joining in the action.
The authors imagine the blockade will pave the way for the landing of PLA's amphibious forces. Meanwhile, China would send stern warnings not to intervene to the U.S., Japan, South Korea, Australia, and other close Taiwan allies.
On the second day after military action, global stock markets will crash due to the turmoil. World leaders will make statements condemning the attack, but nothing more. Washington, bogged down by multiple issues, will be unable to react.
On the third day after the attack, Morell and Winnefeld believe it is too late for Washington to reverse the damage. Then, Xi would whitewash the invasion by telling the world, the "Chinese Dream" has come true and "welcome the people of Taiwan home."
There are other nations that would also seek to take advantage of the power vacuum if the United States were to be too long involved in a domestic crises or, heaven forfend, Balkanize. An abrupt end to the Pax Americana would be a sight to behold, terrible as it would be.
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