The 30 years or so before the Civil War kicked off was a time of outbreaks of street fighting, insurgencies, guerrilla actions, and general instability. The uniformed, shooting war didn’t just materlialize out of nothing.

And as for the military, they can kill huge numbers of people, but that doesn’t mean they can control an unwilling civilian population. Hell, they couldn’t even control a few miliion starving-ass Afghans.

Over three hundred million Americans, 200 million of whom hate your guts? Endless insurgency.