[mullingitover]

There's no point in spending taxpayer money understanding what may or may not happen in the future, when we already know what will happen: Jesus is coming back. We need to spend on the military for the final battle of Armageddon.

^ Literally the beliefs of the most influential part of the political base of the administration.

[anon_shill]

Is this from Bannon and co.? What is their rationale for being militaristic during a return of Jesus? Wouldn't Jesus not like that very much?

[burkaman]

There is no way to know what Jesus would or wouldn't like. Most religious people interpret their chosen text in whatever way best fits their preferences and lifestyle. In this case, they like war, so that means Jesus also likes war: https://jonathanlarsen.substack.com/p/us-troops-were-told-ir.... It is trivial to find Bible verses supporting war if that's what you're looking for: https://www.biblestudytools.com/topical-verses/bible-verses-....

[mullingitover]

This is known as 'negotiating with the text' and people get extremely mad when you describe what they're doing.

[steve_adams_86]

I don't think they literally believe it. They ostensibly espouse this for political purposes, but it doesn't appear they believe in any permanent objective or thing other than their own power and profit.

[mullingitover]

> I don't think they literally believe it.

They do.

Source: They raised me.

I grew up experiencing things like getting an earful any time a nature show said something that contradicted young Earth creationism.

[0xbadcafebee]

It's not, it's Hegseth and others that are Christian Zionists. This is not "christians who like zionism", it's a specific evangelical sect that interprets global conflicts as literal fulfillments of biblical prophecy. The popular tenants of Christian Zionists include that women should be subservient to men, homosexuals are evil, white christians should rule supreme, the confederates got a bad rap, COVID and global warming are a conspiracy, and the big kicker: armageddon is coming and we must prepare the way for Jesus to rule the earth. In order to do that they need to wage holy war / WW3 so that Jesus can come back, defeat everyone, and make a new Earth and rule over it. This is why Hegseth said he's fighting a holy war, why he has Crusader tattoos, etc. It's the Christian version of Islamic Extremism. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Wilson_(theologian) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Hagee)

“He urged us to tell our troops that this was ‘all part of God’s divine plan’ and he specifically referenced numerous citations out of the Book of Revelation referring to Armageddon and the imminent return of Jesus Christ,” the NCO wrote in the email. “He said that ‘President Trump has been anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth.’" - https://www.military.com/daily-news/2026/03/06/lawmakers-wan...