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[Urist McWhatTheHellGuys?]

I set my top squad to kill a trader, after killing him they then turned on each other, why?

[BlackFlyme]

I'm guessing that it was a dwarven merchant?

Sounds like you are facing a loyalty cascade.

[Urist McWhatTheHellGuys?]

Ah... oops.

[ImagoDeo]

Ah... oops.

I love understatement just as much as the next guy, but that's going a little too far, bro. Tone it up a little, ok?

[misko27]

Indeed. Appropriate reactions include, but are not limited to:
1) Rage-quit
2) Despair
3) Disbelief
4) Pleading
5) Save-scumming
6) (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻
7) Taking a long walk and thinking about your life
8.) Pulling all the levers
9) Abandoning immediately
10) Hope.

If you don't save-scum, you're in for a bumpy ride: I recommend healthy doses of 10 (Hope). Try isolating affected dwarves and letting them kill each other (ones with descriptions calling them enemies of the fort, enemies of the civ, or both are affected), ideally activating them (and them alone!) so they attack more. If at any point they stop killing each other, they might be all on the same side; if that side is one completely the enemy of your fort, your soldiers should be able to attack them without becoming an enemy and setting off a problem.

A safe thing would be just to start hiding off citizens (i.e. ones who don't have any "Is an enemy of [insert your fort or civ here]" in their description) off somewhere while others die off. Do not turn on the military of citizens if you do this, because then they will attack their enemies (and thus may end up enemies themselves). Most of these insurrections are spread by military fights, since civilians (of any loyalty) usually run from enemies while the military engage. (which, however, means civilians don't necessarily show whether or not they are affected, since most of the time all you'll get is a cancellation notice from dwarves fleeing the "enemy". Thus they can lull you into a false sense of security).

This can be survived, but there is a strong possibility depending on how far along it is that you'll be left with 10 or fewer civilian dwarfs who'll ignore your commands and eventually get killed in the next attack (read: pray for migrants).

EDIT: Oh hey, the wiki was updated with my research on that! Neat. Will almost certainly be irrelevant in the next version with the new way of handling loyalty (to, in Toady's words, probably be replaced with new and exciting problems!), but still. Covers most of what's in this post though.

[Panando]

Yet another (possibly appropriate) reaction is to dfhack to fix the loyalty cascade. I haven't used it myself because I haven't had the cause, but I know there's a script for it.

[Melting Sky]

I set my top squad to kill a trader, after killing him they then turned on each other, why?

Treachery rarely ends well.

[KiBoy]

I set my top squad to kill a trader, after killing him they then turned on each other, why?

Treachery rarely ends well.

There are much better things to attack than your fellow dorfs... like elves.

[thegoatgod_pan]

I've only ever survived one loyalty cascade, and survive may be a strong word.

The only dwarves left alivr were a marksdwarf and the ruling Baronness, a skilled spearmaid.  The marksdwarf was loyal to the civ, and lost a leg, he was slowly bleed-dragging his way along the decimated surface.

The Baronness was happy and healthy and training in the barracks.  She was also a rebel and skewered all new migrants upon seeing them.

[wierd]

the "rebels" are easily determined, and will still obey burrow restrictions.

just burrow them in the atom smasher and pull the lever.  slab any ghosts.

problem solved.

[TheHossofMoss]

This sounds like some great !!fun!! that I need to partake in, sometime.

[ArmokGoB]

I set my top squad to kill a trader, after killing him they then turned on each other, why?

Treachery rarely ends well.

There are much better things to attack than your fellow dorfs... like elves.

Or giant cave spiders, clowns, zombie giant sponges... literally anything

[Loyalty]

Animals should also work, depending on how well your military is equipped

[Valid_Dark]

I set my top squad to kill a trader, after killing him they then turned on each other, why?

Treachery rarely ends well.

There are much better things to attack than your fellow dorfs... like elves.

I've seen loyalty spirals happen when attacking elf traders

[Duuvian]

I wonder if anyone has ever made a separate group of dwarf bandits this way. It would be kind of not exciting since you are playing against yourself I guess.

The Baronness was happy and healthy and training in the barracks.  She was also a rebel and skewered all new migrants upon seeing them.

Close enough.

I wonder what happens to those dwarves when you abandon? I'd imagine the normal things but if you run into them as an adventurer or in another fort they go nuts on people of their own civilization like before.

It's something to test in the new version, to see what kind of stuff they do afterwards while not in the player's sight.