Thank you for sharing this insight! It's frustrating to hear everyone everywhere speculate about how easily the active military would turn, not considering...well, everything you wrote.

Yeah, ex-military of course is part of the brainwashed; nowhere else in the civilian world (outside of mercenary work) is warfare conducting knowledge of direct use.

Add that our Government has not always done even the bare minimum for our vets, and you got a recipe for the radicalization of the "disenfranchised warriors" (quotation because I don't consider oathbreakers worthy of any title).

They're gonna fall and listen to the honeyed words of Fascism in a different, harder way than your average civilian. That's a call to something they amongst the rest of their group are genuinely and tangibly valuable for--until they aren't.

Please do note that I do see the rise of American fascism as a real threat. It’s just not going to manifest because state Guard orgs decide to disobey orders.

Same, and I do still worry for the death tolls. That "theirs" (the civilians, who can be said to not know better) would be orders of magnitude higher than any on the military's side doesn't mean I'd like to see deaths on either side.