People don't realize in a civil war the military would prob collapse.

US troops, uniquely, are cycled such that there's no regional or ideological cohesion. Infantrymen won't follow the 3rd or 4th LT who's cycled in within 5 years to fight their own people.

50%+ desertion.

This was a policy the US adopted starting in ww1 so that none of units would become regional militias post-war.

They didn't want troops more loyal to their officers in the 3rd Alabama Rifles than the federal government. So they formed "All American" Divisions.

Troops from New York, California and Alaska would serve in the same platoons and their officers cycled from a common pool.

This meant the first civil war could never repeat where entire states took their troops away and had coherent units.

The thing is this also meant the US could never have the cohesion in it's fighting force that the British or the Germans had.

Germans consistently outfought the US in all conditions... because their soldiers and officers knew each other for decades, many were schoolmates

So you had Germans who'd known eachother since gradeschool under officers who were often town heroes in their little German burgs... vs. recent US immigrants next to ohio corn kids, who often didn't even train together or just met their officers a month ago.

The thing is this doesn't even secure the nation from civil war.

The states still have their national guard units who ARE loyal to their state, just because wilson didn't give them 10 more divisions or let the states gain power doesn't mean he took their militias.

So if a civil war does happen, and the federal government tries to employ the national guard... they only imediately have access to the national guard units...

WHO ARE ALREADY MAXIMALLY LOYAL TO THE STATE THEY'D BE DEPLOYED IN

if the feds tries to use the regular military who're randomly mixed from the entire country against say a resistance movement in Pennsylvania... it's very likely those units would face 50% desertion as everyone who either sympathizes with the rebels or doesn't care evaporates

American infantry had one of the highest desertion rates of any power in ww2 due to the morale problems america's messed up unit cohession and bureaucratic culture causes.

Til the 1950s American deserter gangs ran the underworld of Paris and raided military supply convoys.

So the Feds have no regional units they can deploy against rivals. They can't send Connecticut Rifles into West Virginia, & The National Guard will actively resist fed attempts to exert control...

What do the feds have that's loyal?

Less than 100k Federal Agents.

East Germany has over 1 informant or secret policeman per 50 people. And they collapsed.

America has fewer than 1 federal agent per 3400 Americans...

They can't actually exert force against anything but isolated dissidents... Even low level resistance would break it.