You're right about the instruments being different, but I'm just pointing out that the US military has, in the past, set up all-new civilian governments in plac

You're right about the instruments being different, but I'm just pointing out that the US military has, in the past, set up all-new civilian governments in places after bluntly overthrowing the existing governments. In some cases it ended up working out rather well, certainly better than what was there before. So it is absolutely possible, as proven by experience, to use a military power to conquer a place, and then set up a better, democratic, civilian government. Even better, all the places where the military has done this (except Afghanistan) now have much better governments than LA. (Even Afghanistan was better until its government fell because it couldn't defend itself.)