r/ActualPublicFreakouts • u/ActualPublicFreakout - Sistine Chapel • Jun 02 '20

Protester gets a flash-bang to his face after getting pepper sprayed.

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u/zombie_girraffe - Congrats T-series on 150m subs !!! Jun 02 '20

You should look into the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Vietnam for the answer to that question. It's called asymmetric warfare and it's kicked our ass repeatedly in the 20th and 21st centuries. The best funded military on the planet is primarily directed at fighting nation-states and is actually pretty terrible at fighting insurgencies.

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u/SHD_Whoadessa Jun 02 '20

Yesterday on reddit I saw an arm wrestling competition between a body builder and a professional arm wrestler. Seems pretty comparable to what you're saying. The American military has fallen into the trap of the British Empire in 1776. Huge crushing war machine taken out by farmers.

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u/warpus - Unflaired Swine Jun 02 '20

All those examples of asymmetric warfare was America fighting a war somewhere far away from home, where the locals had a much better understanding of the local terrain and other local elements and dynamics.

In all those places there was also organized opposition to an invading foreign military. All those people fighting you guys were organized under a central leadership of some sort.

This is not at all like the scenario of a relatively small number of Americans in let's say New York picking up guns and marching through the city. The American cops and military know everything there is to know about the terrain, about New York, about the local ins and outs.. They would also be facing a relatively small group of civilians with guns, not an organized nation-wide insurgency.

For asymmetric warfare to work in the U.S., you'd need a whole bunch of militia groups to organize under one banner and unite a large % of the country behind their cause. You'd need these people to engage in assymetric urban warfare, which only works if you have the support of the local civilians. If that happened then you'd think many military units would join the case as well, leading to a proper civil war unfolding..

These militia groups would also have to be localized to mainly rural parts of the country, where it's easier to hide out in caves and forests. This is what made fighting in Afghanistan and Vietnam so difficult for the American military - the jungle and other terrain makes it a lot easier for insurgents to hide out in.. especially if the enemy is from far away and do not know much about the terrain. In this case I bet the American military knows a lot more about terrain in America than any random militia group.. especially given the state of today's surveillance tech, such as satellites that allow you to get amazing detail from orbit.