alt.hn

3/7/2026 at 6:04:53 PM

Lawmakers Want DoD Investigated for Biblical 'Armageddon' Claims

 https://www.military.com/daily-news/2026/03/06/lawmakers-want-dod-hegseth-investigated-biblical-armageddon-claims.html

by Jimmc414

3/8/2026 at 3:27:35 AM

It's hard to square a genuine and humble belief in a loving God and creed with the desire to kill a bunch of people and light the world on fire to make him end the world in your time specifically.

by recursivecaveat

3/8/2026 at 6:03:19 AM

> a genuine and humble belief in a loving God

I think it's fair to say that American Evangelists do not worship the god described in the New Testament per se, but instead something closer to the vengeful god of Abrahamic origin. (The mullahs in Iran and pastors in our evangelical churches probably agree on most issues.)

by JumpCrisscross

3/8/2026 at 5:21:19 AM

The Iranian religious authorities have long been essentially united behind very similar attitudes, only centered around the belief that the Mahdi must reappear first, then Jesus afterwards. Both camps believe that Jesus will finally restore true religion, whatever that is.

by zozbot234

3/8/2026 at 8:06:11 AM

[dead]

by assaddayinh

3/7/2026 at 10:09:55 PM

Is this supposed to be a diversion from something else? It’s so over the top, even for this timeline.

by wvbdmp

3/7/2026 at 10:32:24 PM

No, some evangelicals really are this crazy.

by UltraSane

3/8/2026 at 2:28:37 AM

Correct. I was raised but quit this environment around 15. Peculiar to us American's is the Protestant evangelical Christains who for which the apocalyptic books of Revelations, Daniel is literally true. And thereto every 10-15 years there's a bunch of Armageddon is nigh runs hot in their world.

The last one I suffered through was the era of US v. Communism with a side of AIDs around 1980. Seriously demented nonsense.

And something else again from personal dealings here: the evangelical type is pushy boot strapping God's plan for them into material world through networking, media savvy, outrage, fear and basic organizational money raising to power.

Its strange to watch. Alone they seem to have no bearings or self importance or relevance. To get what they feel they need, they attach to the flag, goverment ie to power in state.

by scrubs

3/8/2026 at 3:00:21 AM

I thought Christians got over this when they lost Jerusalem in the Crusades and switched the holy land for Rome.

by PearlRiver

3/8/2026 at 6:49:57 AM

The ones who consider Rome to be holy aren’t, generally speaking, the ones to worry about (at least in this matter). Catholicism considers US Evangelical-style Rapture theology to be heretical, and Catholic soldiers would likely find being pressed by commanders to consider it just as offensive as atheists and other non-Christians would.

by MandieD

3/7/2026 at 11:12:22 PM

yeah, so, if you _ignore the entire Trump_ connected escapades of dimentia, narcissism, pedophilia, etc...

you're still left with a cult of evangelicals who want to usher in the end times by helping Israel.

And if there's to grandiose, there's the more blandness of turning back progress to pre-civil rights, pre-sufferage and returning to Kings as god-given rulers.

Anyone who didn't read project 2025 did a deservice to this string of inanity.

by cyanydeez

3/8/2026 at 12:35:51 AM

Unfortunately, evangelicals have been pushing this interpretation since the 1980s, at least. Many of them voted for Reagan. In my circle of family and friends, several of them were military or contractors with secret-level clearances, ie serious people.

When I read this, I just thought "Oh so its metastasized now."

Those among them who voted for Trump in 2016 hoped for the end times. The whole thing about Trump being "anointed by God to use as he did King Saul" was mainstream in mega-churches at that time. Combine that with decades of recitals that the End Times would be near when Israel's capital moved to Jerusalem (Trump proclaimed that as a handout to evangelicals) and all the nations would come to Megiddo to do battle... this is a well-trodden story.

by FarmerPotato

3/8/2026 at 6:07:30 AM

> evangelicals have been pushing this interpretation since the 1980s, at least

Source? I would have thought it was way older. (Counterargument: high-octane crazy tends to mellow with time.)

by JumpCrisscross

3/9/2026 at 4:45:37 AM

Not sure what source you're asking for... my source is my memory. But here is a brief reading list.

Yes, I'm aware that the theology goes back to the 1890s. I don't know the details. Those details are jammed further down than the story of Americans forgetting that their stone monuments to the 10 Commandments were put up in public spaces as a tie-in with Cecil B. DeMille's movie.

Brief Reagan-era End Times Bibliography

Hal Lindsay: The Late Great Planet Earth. 1970.

Henry Morris: The Revelation Record. 1983.

Salem Kirban: 666 & 1000.

Tim LaHaye: dozens of books, and Left Behind novels. Political actor.

by FarmerPotato

3/8/2026 at 12:14:00 PM

They are referring to the current crop of brimstone evangelists that used their pulpit to push their extremism to great political effect. Jerry Falwell was one of the pioneers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_Majority

by master_crab

3/8/2026 at 2:17:42 PM

You can check out thought leaders in the NAR (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Apostolic_Reformation).

"The US is uniquely responsible for bringing about the end times through violence in the middle east" has been a belief system amongst a subset of american evangelicals, many of whom hold significant power, for a while. But it hasn't been around forever. It really is an idea that grew out of the late 20th century.

by UncleMeat

3/8/2026 at 6:29:00 AM

Maybe they invested too much in VaultCorp?

by cookiengineer

3/8/2026 at 2:33:39 AM

Yes, this is known, religious fanatics in the White House and Tel Aviv are playing out their books.

by pimpampum

3/8/2026 at 6:58:26 AM

I think everybody knows about Left Behind (but nevertheless I'll mention it for good measure), but if you want a shorter fictional version of "this is what these people actually believe", check out the Christ Clone Trilogy by James BeauSeigneur. (Left Behind is too long and poorly written, I myself got bored at like the 8th book or so.)

by bananaflag

3/8/2026 at 7:24:00 AM

What is the saddest thing is that the elections are so far away to remove this dangerous entity from leading america. A democracy turned into an extremist religious abusing populist threat to the whole world. It is on par with russia with its dangerous leadership now

by cantalopes

3/8/2026 at 12:02:42 AM 

  A complaint shared by an anonymous non-commissioned officer to the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF)
  claimed that non-commissioned officers were told that the Iran war is part of God’s plan and that
  President Donald Trump was “anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his
  return to Earth,” as originally reported by journalist Jonathan Larsen.
  
  Between Saturday and Tuesday afternoon, MRFF logged more than 200 similar complaints
  across 50 installations encompassing every branch of the military
Wow

by 0xbadcafebee

3/8/2026 at 2:18:12 AM

Perhaps the speaker was bucking for a Section 8?

by stevenalowe

3/8/2026 at 5:17:53 AM

If you mean the guy saying the crazy stuff, there were at least 50 of them, since the report says the reports came from 50 different locations, in all branches of the military, all in one weekend.

It's real enough that 29 Senators have called for an official investigation.

by 0xbadcafebee

3/8/2026 at 12:57:46 AM

[dead]

by aaron695

3/7/2026 at 11:42:35 PM

I thought it was supposed to be called the Department of War?

by b800h

3/8/2026 at 12:18:56 AM

Supposedly only congress can actually change the name, DoW is a "secondary name", whatever that means. But there is a lot of "supposedly" so the de facto reality seems different.

by embedding-shape

3/8/2026 at 1:51:50 AM

Maybe the "secondary name" is the part that comes after a colon, as in a book title:

  Department of Defence: The Department of War

by nabbed

3/8/2026 at 2:12:11 AM

That was DoA.

by spiderfarmer

3/7/2026 at 9:28:19 PM

American Jihad?

by emsign

3/7/2026 at 10:22:40 PM

Bro its chill WW3 is totally promised to trump 3000 years ago

by chiengineer

3/7/2026 at 8:31:00 PM

Wow, zero comments, that's actually scarier...

by Bombthecat

3/7/2026 at 9:52:50 PM

What do you expect? That people who shove their head in the sand, cover their ears and go "I had nothing to do with this" are suddenly going to wake up and grow a conscience that will threaten their ability to feed themselves?

That people so distant from the decision makers who executed this are going to lose even a night's sleep over it?

That they'll cast themselves on their knees with their cell phone in hand and ask for forgiveness; it was never supposed to be like this?

Not how the world works, friend, though imagine how much nicer a world it would be if it were that way... One can dream I suppose.

by salawat

3/7/2026 at 8:47:51 PM

[flagged]

by chopin

3/7/2026 at 9:08:19 PM

The best they could come up with in that they aren't doing enough to investigate/combat this? Or that this isn't worth investigation in the first place?

by scuff3d

3/7/2026 at 11:22:43 PM

It's not really worth investigation. All the current headlines around this event boil down to a single source report from a litigous activist organization that only claims "anonymous sources".

No corroborating IG investigations or official reporting or even FOIA suits/events, which a serious external investigation would use.

That doesn't make it impossible, just heavily unlikely. Furthermore, it has all the hallmarks of an unsourced smear campaign then used as a convenient 'source' for sensationalist reporting. If the average HN reader were to inspect that source, I exepct they would see the lack of investigative rigour and wonder how the word "source" could even come into consideration here.

by vetrom

3/8/2026 at 2:12:04 AM

The MRFF is saying they got hundreds of complaints. Seems reasonably plausible this actually happened. And given this administrations track record it's not exactly a stretch.

by scuff3d

3/7/2026 at 10:58:12 PM

> non-commissioned officers were told that the Iran war is part of God’s plan and that President Donald Trump was “anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth,” as originally reported by journalist Jonathan Larsen. Between Saturday and Tuesday afternoon, MRFF logged more than 200 similar complaints across 50 installations encompassing every branch of the military,

by stopbulying

3/7/2026 at 11:03:42 PM

Recommended prayers for any faith: Devotional Field Book (MCRP 3-30D.2/6-12D)

by stopbulying

3/7/2026 at 9:23:45 PM

Reminder that the US is responsible for the precision strike murder of at least 165 school children[1]. The fact that they are still 'investigating' after 7 days now is basically an admission that they are indeed responsible for it.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Minab_school_airstrike

by coffinbirth

3/8/2026 at 2:32:27 AM

The latest hypothesis is that it was once an IRGC building many years ago but these reckless idiots in the US military just assumed this unvetted intel was correct.

by burnt-resistor

3/8/2026 at 5:15:41 AM

Quite typical of the terrorist Iranian regime to convert a IRGC compound building into a school for girls. Also typycal for the trigger happy idiots in the US military to take the bait and blow it up during school hours.

by petre

3/8/2026 at 6:41:19 AM

Did you read the Wikipedia link above? Sheesh, 10 years of civilian use.

Imagine if your mom's lived somewhere for many years, and one day the SWAT team barges in and shoots her dead because their intel showed it was a meth lab in 2016...

by netsharc

3/8/2026 at 9:50:01 AM

Isn't that what SWAT teams do? Also, here's the Iranian regime's stance on human shields.

https://iranwire.com/en/politics/71146/

by petre

3/8/2026 at 12:14:37 PM

Ok, it explains it when your hatred of "others" extends to hating your mom.

by netsharc

3/8/2026 at 6:40:51 AM

It was not bait. USA official doctrine right now is "we dont care". Israel was systematically bombing hospitals and civilian infrastructure in all wars.

It does not matter what regime is Iran. This one is squarly on USA. USA dis not took bait, but did what it promissed to do.

by watwut

3/8/2026 at 9:42:27 AM

> It was not bait. USA official doctrine right now is "we dont care"

Hospitals lose protection under international law when used for military purposes for good reason. Iran and its proxies have essentially been abusing the conventions that held until now. That doesn't excuse hitting a school, nor suggest that we should do away with these protections. But if one side keeps using schools and hospitals to cover materiel, the notion that those are not legitimate military targets becomes untenable.

by JumpCrisscross

3/8/2026 at 10:24:50 AM

American official attitude is "there are no rules of engagement those are stupid".

Nice apologia attempt, but no. Somehow all hospitals where Israel operates are oitside of geneva convention, always. All the accusations you made here are made up on the spot by you.

This is not about Iran abusing convention. This is USA and Israel official doctrine being like "it does not apply to us" and "the fact that we dont care makes us manly".

The school in question did not hosted missiles. And when israel "ordered" 200000 people to move away else they are valid target of murder, they were trying to create local refugee crisis.

by watwut

3/8/2026 at 6:26:02 PM

> American official attitude is "there are no rules of engagement those are stupid"

Yeah, that was Hegseth being an idiot.

> apologia attempt, but no

Not an apology. Just an explanation of relevant law. If America started piling muntions on its hospital ships, those would be legal targets in a war. (We'd still complain when it was bombed.)

The more fundamental issue is nobody is following those rules anymore. China, Russia and America have explicitly rejected them. Israel, Iran and its proxies, too.

> This is not about Iran abusing convention

Not liking a fact doesn't make it untrue. America, Iran and Israel are each acting well outside the bounds of international law and have been for some time.

> school in question did not hosted missiles

We don't know. We have no evidence it did, so my default is this was a fuckup by America.

It should bring consequences. It won't, in part because we're in a world where it doesn't for any of America's adversaries. (Who, in turn, dovetailed off America's example in the Cold War. Though it's not like Iran and China weren't busy running roughshod over international law in that time, either.)

> when israel "ordered" 200000 people to move away else they are valid target of murder, they were trying to create local refugee crisis

Nobody wants a refugee crisis. What you're correctly identifying is there is limited regard for civilian casualties on the Israeli side. Though based on current numbers, they're well within norms (in Iran).

by JumpCrisscross

3/7/2026 at 10:17:30 PM

Can someone explain why this is being downvoted?

by dtj1123

3/8/2026 at 6:05:26 AM

> Can someone explain why this is being downvoted?

It's not relevant. We have no evidence one of the nutters ordered the strike. Which makes the far more likely answer of fuckup/collateral damage in the course of a major bombing campaign a good default.

by JumpCrisscross

3/8/2026 at 8:11:22 AM

At a future time it may become apparent that these events are linked in some way. It's too early to pin them together for sure, but I don't see a problem with raising awareness.

by dtj1123

3/8/2026 at 9:39:59 AM

> It's too early to pin them together for sure, but I don't see a problem with raising awareness

It's baseless speculation. That isn't fodder for thoughtful discussion, particulary when framed as a statement versus a question.

by JumpCrisscross

3/8/2026 at 10:23:43 AM

I'm seeing this more as filing under "potentially relevant" rather than explicit speculation, but I can see your point. Thanks for the clarification.

by dtj1123

3/8/2026 at 12:01:51 PM

Hegseth is religious radical who invites religious radicals to speak to troops. He is the head of the operation and openly promotes "maximum lethality, rules of engagement are stupid, we dont do defenders we do warriors" philosophy.

So, imo there us a relationship between "religious nutter" leading department of war and army not being bothered with bombing schools or hospitals.

by watwut

3/8/2026 at 3:14:43 PM

The Zionist influence on our government, is not Christian Zionism. Focusing on that is totally ineffectual and that’s the whole point. Those who focus on that issue are doing it to further Zionist influence over policy, either intentionally or out of useful idiocy. Rubio is Catholic, as is Vance, 100% opposed to Christian Zionism. Kushner is not a Catholic, nor Witkoff, nor Epstein, nor Lutnick, nor Blinkin. Btw it’s possible to be a Zionist Christian who believes in Israel’s right to self defense, but Christia Zionism (the fringe theology) is not representative of the vast majority of Christian’s views. I mean, are Palestinian Christians Christian Zionists? How about Lebanese or Iranian or Assyrian Christians? How about the Pope or Archbishop of Canterbury? Don’t be an unwitting tool of the (non-Christian) Zionists deflection campaign; it’s a shell game.

by bitroughj

3/8/2026 at 3:48:14 PM

I never knew about "Christian zionism", or how it is so deeply tied with American politics till I watched these 2 interviews - https://tuckercarlson.com/tucker-show-fares-abraham-021826 and https://tuckercarlson.com/tucker-show-mike-huckabee-022026 (Yeah, I know it is from Tucker Carlson, and there is a lot of crap on his site. But there are some rare gems - good interviews - like these that offer us a rare insight into American and international politics. It is on his interview that the American ambassador to Israel publicly said that Israel has a "bibilical right" to the whole of middle-east and America is fine with those Israeli aspirations!)

by thisislife2

3/8/2026 at 5:27:18 PM

Yes, the ambassador to Israel is very philosemitic. Shocking? I suppose if you don’t know what an ambassador is. Ambassadors do not determine policy, they maintain friendly relationships.

Who is more powerful, Ted Cruz (another “powerful” “Christian” Zionist) or Donald Trump? Or Larry Ellison vs Pastor Hagee?

It’s great that people can learn stuff. It’s worth learning, for example, who got us into the Iraq war. Hint: it wasn’t “Christian” Zionists. There are very few Christian Zionists, and almost none in positions of power compared to (non-Christian) religious or ethno-nationalist Zionists.

by bitroughj

3/8/2026 at 6:14:55 PM

> Ambassadors do not determine policy, they maintain friendly relationships.

Yes, they however do spout the policy of the government they represent. And they are supposed to be diplomats (good diplomats do not say anything to jeopardise their country's relationships with other countries whom they call "allies" too).

by thisislife2

3/8/2026 at 6:53:53 PM

You’ve persuaded me, Mike Huckabee is not a good ambassador if your goal is not to escalate anti-American sentiment in the Middle East, especially amongst our non-Israeli allies.

by bitroughj

3/8/2026 at 6:08:43 PM

Translation: Jews. This post is incredibly conspiracist.

by zappb

3/8/2026 at 6:54:22 PM

Most Jews are not Zionists.

by bitroughj

3/8/2026 at 8:52:25 AM

Don't immanentize the eschaton!

by ZeroGravitas

3/8/2026 at 12:43:29 PM

The standard political capability/loyalty test was to show how much coolaid you could sell with a strait face, as it is no longer selling very well, the new test is to show how much they can publicly consume themselves.

by metalman

3/7/2026 at 8:45:12 PM

Wait until you see these "YIGBY" bills that are being passed across the country

by afpx

3/7/2026 at 10:19:55 PM

I'm not religious myself, and I have plenty of concerns about anything faith based mingling with the government, but I don't see how building affordable houses on church property has anything to do with military leaders telling their soldiers they're warriors for God.

by scuff3d

3/7/2026 at 10:32:05 PM

I guess rogue doomsday cults trying to destroy the planet need to arise from time to time to remind us of how silly they are.

by phendrenad2

3/8/2026 at 2:48:44 AM

When they are the people in charge of the nuclear arsenal, the silliness stops.

by discardable_dan

3/8/2026 at 12:12:31 AM

It would be amusing if it wasn't possible for them to achieve their goals, which they're now in a position to do so.

by pstuart

3/8/2026 at 5:48:10 AM

That's true, this is more of a retroactive analysis, because the other outcome (where the Earth is destroyed) is the end of everything anyway, so no sense considering it.

by phendrenad2

3/8/2026 at 2:29:40 AM

MRFF is working overtime because Christofascists remain at the top of the military and civilian leadership. They're psychotic death cult crazies who want war and have little regard for human life. These criminal lunatics are a threat to all of humanity.

by burnt-resistor

3/8/2026 at 6:11:33 PM

[dead]

by butterbomb