> Except the South, presumably Texas sympathizers, are way over represented in the military. The next largest region of over-representation are your flyover states, which political lean red.

That's not true. The overrepresented regions are basically the South and the West. The Midwest “flyover states” and Northeast are the most underrepresented areas.

And while the South is overrepresented, (Also, military recruitment isn't necessarily politically representative of the states it is drawn from; sure, the Deep South is overrepresented, but that's also a big part of the reason the Blacks are super-overrepresented in the military (making up nearly triple the share of the military as of the country at large.) And Southern Blacks politically don't look the same as “the South” more broadly.

Not true according to my citation and others in the past. Looking at the Western states that over-represent, the Idaho, Arizona, and even Oregon have more in common with Texas than California/D.C. The PNW themselves deal with a vocal secession movement.

even if they were politically sympathetic they would have to abandon their oath to the constitution and turn and fight the rest of the Marines. Also, there's a lot more to the party than just Marines. I doubt there would be as much hesitation by drone operators sitting in office buildings firing on any armed citizen in any city in Texas. Let alone AI feeding targets of opportunity to a queue where operators just click the "approve" button...

I just don't think the secession people have thought about the level of violence required to actually secede. And even then what happens next? A blockade and sanctions then the entire state slowly starves to death or submission. Maybe Texas could form an alliance with Mexico.. ok now the United States declares war on Mexico. I don't think Mexico would want that.

the whole secession story just falls apart after 10 minutes of thought.

The Constitution is strong because of the robustness of the structure it specifies via checks and balances, not because people pledge an oath. I also don't think it's obvious that the US would go to war to preserve the union.

What i meant by "oath to the constitution" is the US military doesn't pledge allegiance to an administration or ideology or region. Its only purpose is to uphold the constitution of the United States of America. That's why the military operates the same no matter which political party is in power. At the end of the day, its only purpose is to defend the constitution.

If the US didn't goto war to preserve the union then the US, as defined the US constitution, ceases to exist. There is no provision in the constitution laying out the right (or even the method) for secession.

> There is no provision in the constitution laying out

Sure there is. It is called the amendment process, and requires a supermajority vote.

Unless, you are going to claim that using the amendment process, officially, as laid out in the constitution is some treasonous act, that the military would stop.

(Funnily enough, I have see people make this silly argument! That it is unconstitutional to use the official constitutional amendment process, and is treason!)

I mean the tenth amendment would imply the decision to secede is up to the states. There's no prohibition on secession in the constitution and I think it was evidence to the states when they formed a union that their union was voluntary, not coerced. IMO the decision to block secession was a treasonous and seditious act by Lincoln, and he has a lot of blood on his hands.

Google US Civil War