The Observer (2022-01-09)

The Observer
32 09.01.22 Focus

LEFT

Donald Trump

still has a huge

following in

the Republican

party. Getty

United States

The anxiety is fed by rancour in
Washington, where Biden’s desire
for bipartisanship has crashed into
radicali sed Republican opposi-
tion. The president’s remarks on
Thursday – “I will allow no one to
place a dagger at the throat of our
democracy” – appeared to acknowl-
edge that there can be no busi-
ness as usual when one of America’s
major parties has embraced
authoritarianism.
Illustrating the point, almost no
Republicans attended the com-
memorations as the party seeks
to rewrite history, recasting the
mob who tried to overturn Donald
Trump’s election defeat as mar-
tyrs fi ghting for democracy. Tucker
Carlson, the most watched host on
the conservative Fox News network,
refused to play any clips of Biden’s
speech, arguing that 6 January 2021
“barely rates as a footnote” histor-
ically because “really not a lot hap-
pened that day”.
With the cult of Trump more
dominant in the Republican party
than ever, and radical rightwing
groups such as the Oath Keepers
and Proud Boys on the march, some
regard the threat to democracy as

greater now than it was a year ago.

Among those raising the alarm is

Barbara Walter, a political scientist

at the University of California, San

Diego, and author of a new book,

How Civil Wars Start: And How to

Stop Them.

S

he had previously

served on the political

instability task force, an

advisory panel to the

CIA, which had a model

to predict political vio-

lence in countries all over the world

• except the US. Yet with the rise of
  Trump’s racist demagoguery, Walter,
  who has studied civil wars for 30
  years, recogni sed telltale signs on
  her own doorstep.
  One was the emergence of a gov-
  ernment that is neither fully dem-
  ocratic nor fully autocratic – an
  “anocracy”. The other is a land-
  scape devolving into identity politics
  where parties no longer organise
  around ideology or specifi c policies
  but along racial, ethnic or religious
  lines.
  Walter told the Observer: “By
  the 2020 elections, 90% of the
  Republican party was now white.
  On the task force, if we were to
  see that in another multi-ethnic,

multi-religious country which is

based on a two-party system, this is

what we would call a super faction,

and a super faction is particularly

dangerous.”

Not even the gloomiest pessimist

is predicting a rerun of the 1861-65

civil war with red and blue armies

fi ghting pitched battles.

“It would look more like Northern

Ireland and what Britain experi-

enced, where it’s more of an insur-

gency,” Walter said. “It would

probably be more decentrali sed

than Northern Ireland because we

have such a large country and there

are so many militias all around the

country.

“They would turn to unconven-

tional tactics, in particular terror-

ism, maybe even guerrilla warfare,

where they would target federal

buildings, synagogues, places with

large crowds. The strategy would be

one of intimidation and to scare the

American public into believing that

the federal government isn’t capable

of taking care of them.”

A 2020 plot to kidnap Gretchen

Whitmer, the Democratic gover-

nor of Michigan, could be a sign

of things to come. Walter suggests

that opposition fi gures, moder-

ate Republicans and judges deemed

Continued from page 31

n

e

ffollowing in

the Republican

pparty. Getty

The major

fl ashpoints