It's a straw-man to nitpick only the worst-case scenario - a full-on civil war against a nuke-wielding government. Syria is an on-going example of people invol

It's a straw-man to nitpick only the worst-case scenario - a full-on civil war against a nuke-wielding government. Syria is an on-going example of people involved in limited engagements with a somewhat modern government, defending themselves with small arms. They don't need to be ideal to be better than nothing. Even in Syria, a large part of the armed forces refused to fight their own people. I imagine in America it would be a greater percentage, and you'd only be facing limited local insurrectionists. And it'd be enough to hold out for help, rather than battle them to a stand-still ala Rambo.