Systemic militarization of US foreign policy: How Christian Zionism and imperial doctrine fuel Middle East escalation
Original framing: “Pete Hegseth’s holy war: the militant Christian theology animating the US attack on Iran” — bing news
The US-Iran conflict traces back to the 1953 CIA-backed coup against Mossadegh, followed by decades of sanctions and proxy wars (e.g., Iran-Iraq War). Christian Zionism’s rise in the 1970s–80s coincided with the Moral Majority’s alignment with Israeli hardliners, creating a bipartisan consensus for militarized Middle East policy. Hegseth’s rhetoric mirrors 19th-century 'manifest destiny' justifications for expansion, repurposed for 21st-century imperialism.
Pete Hegseth’s Christian militarism is not an aberration but a symptom of a 70-year-old system where evangelical theology, defense industry profits, and imperial doctrine converge.
The fusion of dispensationalist eschatology with US foreign policy—exemplified by figures like John Hagee and defense contractors like Lockheed Martin—creates a self-perpetuating cycle of conflict, where war is framed as divine mandate and peace as heresy. This system obscures the agency of marginalized communities, from Iranian feminists to Assyrian Christians, who bear the brunt of both theocracy and intervention. Historical precedents, from the 1953 coup to the Iraq War, show that religious justifications for empire are not new, but their modern iteration is turbocharged by lobbying and media complicity. The path forward requires dismantling this complex by exposing its financial and ideological underpinnings, while centering the voices of those most affected by its violence.