r/politics • u/WingComplex6771 • 14d ago

Soft Paywall Trump Plans Military “Reaction Force” to Use Against Americans

https://newrepublic.com/post/199008/trump-plans-military-reaction-force-use-americans
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338

u/Comfortable-Pause279 14d ago

Yeah... if I were a "One weekend a month, two weeks a year" national guard guy I don't think I would be super-duper thrilled to sign up for the shitty "special" companies where they're immediately talking about putting you on a 90 day rotation to go be a full-time riot goon and tear gas protestors domestically.

That doesn't sound like something that builds skills for your civilian career, and I don't think it sounds super-rad for your military career. Everyone else in the National Guard and the reserves are all off training to fight and survive in, like, actual shooting wars and shit.

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u/aravarth 14d ago

putting you on a 90-day rotation

Don't fool yourself, they'd put you on a 28-day rotation so they wouldn't have to pay you BAH.

Or, alternatively, it's be a 12-month tour, and the admin would expect you to do it on your own dime.

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u/MonsieurLinc Michigan 14d ago

Absolutely it'd be a 28-day rotation with like two platoons or so sent into a city to "control crime" by standing outside the local federal building for a photo op. Just to be sent home to find out that your wife left with Jody because at least he didn't volunteer to be a fascist goosestepper.

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u/gentlemanidiot 14d ago

Sometimes TACO means Trump always chickens out, sometimes it means Trump always cheaps out

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u/TransBrandi 14d ago

lol, if they were to do that it would be so stupid. If you want to have a military dictatorship you actually need the support of the guys doing violence on your behalf. That usually means better treatment for them, their families, etc.

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u/IrritableGourmet New York 14d ago

There is something so far-fetched and so extravagant in the idea of danger to liberty from the militia, that one is at a loss whether to treat it with gravity or with raillery; whether to consider it as a mere trial of skill, like the paradoxes of rhetoricians; as a disingenuous artifice to instil prejudices at any price; or as the serious offspring of political fanaticism. Where in the name of common-sense, are our fears to end if we may not trust our sons, our brothers, our neighbors, our fellow-citizens? What shadow of danger can there be from men who are daily mingling with the rest of their countrymen and who participate with them in the same feelings, sentiments, habits and interests? (Federalist 29)

I hope the Framers were right. If they use National Guard, they're going to have to deal with soldiers who spend the majority of their time as civilians.

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u/Lilswingingdick212 14d ago

This is delusional. They’re already our family and neighbors and they want to kill us for not blindly following Trump.

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u/Ill-Product-1442 14d ago

I guess they never considered the possibility of a fascist having people hand-picked for service to oppress their own countrymen

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u/CobaltVale 14d ago edited 14d ago

Actually people at the time did. The Federalist papers are just the new merchant class at the time struggling with political philosophy.

They're complete dogshit.

A cursory look at Roman history would have told you that passage is just looney. Modern examples like Nazi Germany of course exist, as your comment references.

I specifically use Roman history because people of that era loved Roman history to an absurd degree, especially the "founding fathers."

Except you know, when it didn't align with their goals. Then they just ignored it.

Rome had so many civil wars and literal political purges its kind of amazing people view it as some beacon of civilization. It strangely wasn't until Rome became an empire under Augustus that ushered in an era known as the "pax romana" -- which is the image of peace, stability, and prosperity that most people have in their head of Rome.

But Republican Rome was a chaotic, brutal, blood-stained mess filled with back stabbing and tyranny.

So I don't know what Hamilton was smoking when he wrote that passage but it's full of hopium.

But all of this is actually covered pretty well in the Anti-Federalist papers, specifically this: https://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_8_12s23.html

This may be an easier read: https://teachingamericanhistory.org/document/brutus-x/

You may be told, these instances will not apply to our case:--But those who would persuade you to believe this, either mean to deceive you, or have not themselves considered the subject.

So fucking true.

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u/WRDPKNMSC 14d ago

bad news about some of your neighbors

think about it like this: the ICE agents are also from that same group of civilians

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u/I_am_BrokenCog California 14d ago

The Federalist Papers were the right-wing group of Original Framer's who were butt sore about not getting all their dreams into the Constitution.

They got a lot of them -- but with typical Conservative Reactionary self-grandiosity; they were pissy they didn't get everything their way.

Just remember who the Original American Conservatives were. They were the Royalists.

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u/CobaltVale 14d ago

This passage really highlights the fact that the Federalist papers were complete dogshit when they were written and they're definitely complete dogshit now.

Even for its time it was completely ignorant of history to the point of being disingenuous.

0

u/trobsmonkey 14d ago

History shows this. Soldiers don't want to attack their friends, family, countrymen. They want to defend the home, conquer new lands.

Getting the military to attack your own people is extremely difficult

3

u/korben2600 Arizona 14d ago

Depends what they're fighting for. Putin's Rosgvardia doesn't struggle with enforcing a dictatorship. Or Stalin's NKVD. Or Hitler's SS. But that's of course under totalitarian rule where there's no choice but to obey. The calculus does probably change when asked to actively fight against your own democracy and freedoms.

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u/MCPtz California 14d ago

They can send them to a different state they've never lived in, into neighborhoods with a different ethnic makeup, with people who disagree with their political allegiances...

There are enough men out there who would be willing to do this, even going so far as to get shafted on pay that was promised, and perform acts of violence while feeling anonymous and protected by masks.

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u/trobsmonkey 14d ago

There are enough men out there who would be willing to do this, even going so far as to get shafted on pay that was promised, and perform acts of violence while feeling anonymous and protected by masks.

If there were the LAPD wouldn't have recruitment issues. ICE wouldn't be putting on the recruitment blitz because of how hard it is to find people willing to do this shit.

Most people don't want to hurt their neighbors

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u/MCPtz California 14d ago

ICE is putting on a recruitment blitz because they just massively increased their budget.

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u/CobaltVale 14d ago

Unless they're Jewish of course.

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u/JoinHomefront 14d ago

I will say that most men and women who serve in the Guard are severely underemployed and many will jump at Title 10 opportunities that provide not only better base pay than their civilian work, but come with BAH and federal protections against losing their job (at least theoretically). I say this as a former company commander—and before that platoon leader and XO—in a National Guard company with people who had above median transferable civilian skills in a well above median market.

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u/Moku-O-Keawe 14d ago

Also illegal.

1

u/jackfirecracker 14d ago

I debated joining the NG during the Biden years and am glad I didn’t

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u/S31Ender 14d ago

You think this is going to stay with tear gas?

Mark my words, someone somewhere is going to have enough and will pop off for real at some of these guys and then it’ll be chaos.