Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, and the March 14 Surrender
Military Doctrine and the War for Democratic Survival
March 14, 2025, will be remembered as the moment Senate Democrats blinked.
On that day, Senate Minority leader Chuck Schumer broke ranks with House Democrats and voted to keep the regime running—advancing a “dirty” Continuing Resolution (CR) (which we discuss in detail here) that not only funds the government but legitimizes Elon Musk’s piecemeal shutdown of federal agencies under Trump’s directive.
The House had held the line, refusing to rubber-stamp a budget that institutionalizes authoritarian carve-outs. Schumer folded. In doing so, he appears to have fractured the party and emboldened Trump’s creeping consolidation of power.
This is not just political cowardice. It is a strategic failure of the highest order.
And failures must be answered not with resignation, but with escalation.
The Democratic response cannot be just rhetorical outrage or vague commitments to “hold Trump accountable.” This is a war. A war for control of public legitimacy, for institutional survival, and for the very structure of governance itself.
We must apply the lessons of Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, and modern military doctrine—because if we keep playing by peacetime rules, we lose everything.
I. Clausewitz: The Center of Gravity and the War for Legitimacy
Carl von Clausewitz, the Prussian military strategist, defined the “center of gravity” as the focal point that holds an enemy’s strength together. If you break that, the enemy collapses.
For the Trump regime, that center of gravity is legitimacy.
Every Musk-driven agency shutdown normalizes the idea that the federal government can be dismantled.
Every concession—Schumer’s vote, Biden’s inaction—reinforces the illusion that this is just politics as usual.
Every time Trump forces an outrageous new policy and it is met with only statements of disapproval, he gains ground.
█ Trump’s endgame is not just budget cuts or bureaucratic restructuring. It is to render federal authority meaningless—then replace it.
Why Schumer Blinked—And Why It Was a Mistake
Some Democrats may argue that Schumer acted out of necessity, fearing that a government shutdown would hand Trump a greater excuse to consolidate power.
That logic is flawed.1
Because Trump’s strategy is not normal governance. It is a slow-motion decommissioning of the state.
Every concession strengthens the regime’s ability to normalize executive rule. Trump does not need a crisis to seize power—he is already doing it in plain sight, using Musk’s shutdowns to strip away agency authority step by step.
By refusing to fight, Schumer ensured that the dismantling continues, just at a slower pace.
The Immediate Response
Schumer’s betrayal must have consequences—not as revenge, but as a warning. The House must escalate immediately—legislative blockades, procedural warfare, and open retaliation.
Trump’s legitimacy must be denied at every level. If Musk’s privatized governance is treated as real, we lose. States, mayors, and local agencies must refuse compliance.
Democrats must stop negotiating their own demise. Concessions are not preserving government function—they are legitimizing its dismantling.
█ We are at war for the perception of who governs America. If Democrats fail to contest this battlefield, Trump wins by default.
II. Sun Tzu: Turning Trump’s Overreach Into His Collapse
Sun Tzu’s Art of War teaches that an enemy’s greatest weakness often lies in its greatest strength. A force that advances too aggressively can be lured into overextension—and then destroyed.
Schumer’s vote, Musk’s agency shutdowns, Trump’s relentless pace of executive overreach—these are all overextensions.
They are moving too fast. They assume resistance is fragmented. They assume the opposition will cave.
We must use this.
Step One: Make Them Own Schumer’s Betrayal
The House must go beyond condemnation. Frame Schumer’s move as a strategic failure, not just a moral one.
Frame AOC’s primary challenge as a battle for the future of the party. Make it clear: the issue is not just Schumer—it is whether Senate Democrats will be complicit or resistant.
Push Senate Democrats into a choice. Either they join House Democrats in resistance, or they are publicly tied to Musk’s deconstruction agenda.2
Step Two: Disrupt the Senate’s Functionality
If the Senate won’t stand with the House, the House must make governing impossible.
Use every procedural tool to block cooperation. No unanimous consent, forced votes on every amendment, exposing every collaborator.
If Senate Democrats won’t fight, make them irrelevant.
Step Three: Make the Regime Bleed for Every Move
Every agency shutdown must be a crisis. Democrats must launch lawsuits, media blitzes, and grassroots mobilization against each closure.
Frame every Republican vote as complicity in authoritarian rule. The GOP must not be allowed to claim they are merely passing budgets—they are restructuring government into an autocratic tool.
█ The lesson from Sun Tzu is clear: Trump’s aggression is his weakness. The faster he moves, the more mistakes he makes. Democrats must ensure that every overreach creates instability within his own coalition.
III. Modern Military Doctrine: Hold, Advance, Sabotage
Step One: Hold Ground Where It Matters Most
House Democrats must maintain absolute unity. If the House fractures, this battle is over.
No further Democratic concessions in the Senate. Any Democrat who wavers must be treated as complicit.
Step Two: Open New Fronts
Legal warfare must escalate immediately. Every Musk-led agency shutdown must be challenged in court—not just on its legality, but on its legitimacy.
Media warfare must go beyond statements. The narrative must be clear: Trump’s restructuring of government is unconstitutional.
State-Level Resistance: Governors must refuse to recognize Musk’s privatized federal functions. Cities must refuse to comply with federal enforcement that lacks legal authority.
Step Three: Force the Regime Into Unforced Errors
Force Trump to defend his weakest actions. Every governor, every Democratic senator must make the shutdowns a political nightmare.
Turn every Musk-driven closure into a public scandal. Investigate contracts, expose corruption, build pressure for judicial intervention.
█ We must wage two wars: the direct one, and a higher-level war whose map determines the available loci and very channels in which the first takes place.
IV. Guerrilla Warfare: When Institutions Fail, Fight Everywhere
The executive branch is compromised. The courts are compromised. Senate leadership is unreliable.
That means the fight must be waged asymmetrically—across multiple battlefields, not just in Congress.
Governors must establish parallel governance structures to counter Musk’s agency takeovers.
Mayors must refuse compliance with federal directives that contradict existing law.
Public institutions—colleges, state agencies, unions—must become sites of resistance.
Guerrilla warfare doctrine teaches asymmetry is power. If national Democrats fail, the fight must shift to states and cities.
The resistance cannot be passive resistance. It must be active, constant, and escalatory. We have discussed this elsewhere at length,3 so we won’t belabor it here.
█ This is the essence of Radical Federalism. Assymmerric, decentralized and distributed resistance on every front.
V. The Time to Act Is Now
Schumer’s vote is not just another Democratic capitulation. It is a signal that national leadership is divided, hesitant, and unprepared.
We must act before the next Schumer emerges.
Make Schumer pay the highest political cost possible. The House’s immediate escalation is essential.
Sabotage the regime’s ability to function. House Democrats have the tools—procedural warfare, legal action, electoral primaries. Use them.
Treat this as the early stages of a coup, because that’s what it is. They will escalate. So must we.
This is the moment when we decide whether 2028 even happens.
If we fight hard enough, early enough, we can break their momentum before their consolidation is complete.
But if we hesitate—if we act like this is just another bad bill, just another sellout politician—then we will wake up one day to find there is no opposition left.
█ The war is here. Fight accordingly.
Schumer’s defenders will say he was making a calculated decision: that preventing a Trump-engineered shutdown was the lesser evil. That conceding here preserved some semblance of governance, keeping the lights on while waiting for a better opportunity to fight.
But this was a fundamental strategic failure—one that ignores the reality of Trump’s war on governance.
Schumer operated as if he was dealing with a normal opponent, one who values stability, who can be negotiated with, who is bound by the same incentives as past presidents. That is not the case. Trump does not fear a government shutdown. Trump is already running one, in slow motion. Musk’s piecemeal agency closures aren’t threats to be bargained with—they are proof of concept for the regime’s long-term plan.
By caving on this CR, Schumer didn’t prevent Trump’s takeover—he legitimized it. The shutdown strategy is no longer hypothetical. It is now ratified Senate policy.
The correct move—the move House Democrats understood—was not to stall for time, but to force a confrontation now, before the regime is ready for full-scale escalation. Instead, Schumer gave them time to consolidate, setting the stage for future collapses that will be framed as inevitable.
Schumer’s miscalculation does not mean every Senate Democrat is lost. The Senate is not yet fully Trump’s—but it is at a tipping point.
Some senators backed this cloture vote reluctantly, seeing it as a necessary evil. They must be pulled back. Others, like Manchin and Sinema, are lost causes—too deeply entrenched in transactional politics to recognize the existential stakes.
The House must now force a reckoning in the Senate:
Push every Democratic senator into a binary choice. Either they align with the House’s resistance, or they are tied to Schumer’s failure.
Target winnable defectors. If some senators voted yes out of fear rather than conviction, drag them back—make this vote a liability they must atone for.
Cut off the collaborators. Any Democrat who doubles down on the Schumer betrayal must be politically isolated. That means primary threats, public pressure, and forcing them into vulnerable positions in every future vote.
Schumer is weakened. His allies in the Senate must now choose their survival strategy. If they believe aligning with him is the safer path, we have already lost. Make them afraid to stand still.
Governors and mayors must refuse to recognize Musk’s federal agency takeovers as legitimate. If federal services collapse in their states, they must:
Publicly denounce the closures as illegitimate. Every agency shuttered by Musk must be treated as a deliberate, unlawful sabotage of governance.
Refuse state cooperation with Trump’s parallel government. If Musk-controlled entities demand local compliance, Democratic governors must block them at every turn.
Set up parallel governance structures. If federal functions are dismantled, states must step in. That means state-run equivalents to decommissioned agencies, preventing Trump from using chaos to justify further consolidation.
The courts must also be mobilized:
State attorneys general must sue over agency shutdowns. These closures violate statutory authority. Every legal avenue must be used to slow Trump’s consolidation.
Judges must resist Trump’s directives wherever possible. If the federal judiciary becomes fully captured, state courts must act as a firewall, refusing to enforce illegitimate orders.
The regime is counting on passive adaptation—on Democrats at the state level accepting these changes as fait accompli. That must be denied.
Governors, mayors, and legal officials must understand: this is not just a federal crisis. It is a direct attack on state sovereignty.