If you were wondering why US actions seem completely self-defeating and make no strategic sense whatsoever, it’s because they are led by lunatics:

A combat-unit commander told non-commissioned officers at a briefing Monday that the Iran war is part of God’s plan and that Pres. Donald Trump was “anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth,” according to a complaint by a non-commissioned officer.

From Saturday morning through Monday night, more than 110 similar complaints about commanders in every branch of the military had been logged by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF).

The complaints came from more than 40 different units spread across at least 30 military installations, the MRFF told me Monday night

[…]

The NCO wrote to the MRFF that their commander “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.”

[…]

“These calls have one damn thing in freaking common; our MRFF clients [service members who seek MRFF aid] report the unrestricted euphoria of their commanders and command chains as to how this new “biblically-sanctioned” war is clearly the undeniable sign of the expeditious approach of the fundamentalist Christian “End Times” as vividly described in the New Testament Book of Revelation.

Many of their commanders are especially delighted with how graphic this battle will be zeroing in on how bloody all of this must become in order to fulfill and be in 100% accordance with fundamentalist Christian end of the world eschatology."

[…]

“This morning our commander opened up the combat readiness status briefing by urging us to not be “afraid” as to what is happening with our combat operations in Iran right now. 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. 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”. He had a big grin on his face when he said all of this which made his message seem even more crazy.”

  • Commiejones@lemmygrad.ml
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    11 hours ago

    So are we gonna get some fragging? I know there was talk of the Ford’s plumbing issues being soft mutiny but that was before the missiles were flying. With this sort of lunacy somebody gonna do more than just report them right?

    • cfgaussian@lemmygrad.mlOP
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      11 hours ago

      Not until their friends start dying in large numbers. Right now for most of them filing a complaint is the most resistance they can imagine. Even resigning is unthinkable because they would lose their income and their benefits.

  • TheRedWedge@lemmygrad.ml
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    19 hours ago

    I remember hearing rumors for a few years now that the US military is full of evangelical doomsday cultists in the higher ranks. Always seemed like one of those actually entirely plausible conspiracy theories but I wasn’t quite ready for it to be actually true.

  • p0ntyp00l@lemmygrad.ml
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    19 hours ago

    These religious extremist terrorists must be dealt with, I pray that the American people can rise up, seize power, and restore women’s rights (after a few rounds of constant bombing).

  • amemorablename@lemmygrad.ml
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    19 hours ago

    Maybe I’m coping here, but I have to wonder if it’s some kind of cynical calculus to push troops into a meat grinder war on the basis of religious fanaticism because there isn’t much of a reason for them to care otherwise, especially not reason to throw their lives away so easy. Like the narrative basis for attacking Iran is pretty sloppy as narratives go and on top of that, a significant amount of the country just kinda hates Trump, a good amount is pissed about what israel’s doing too. I don’t know quite how that looks in the US military, I’d guess it swings more loyal overall than the regular population, but not without some discontent (if anyone has stats on it, please correct me if I’m off here).

    • cfgaussian@lemmygrad.mlOP
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      19 hours ago

      Nah. Liberal “humanitarianism” works much better as a religious motivation to get Westerners on board with a crusade against “the barbarians”. Liberalism is the real unifying religious ideology of the US rather than fundamentalist Christianity.

      This armageddon cult thing only works on those who already believe in it. It’s pretty hard to convert someone to this nonsense who hasn’t been indoctrinated from birth. The US military is also too diverse, this shit just undermines morale.

      All in all, a win-win for us if our enemies are so detached from reality…my only worry is if they decide to accelerate armageddon by using nukes.

      • amemorablename@lemmygrad.ml
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        8 hours ago

        my only worry is if they decide to accelerate armageddon by using nukes.

        That’s I guess the crux of it for me and why I’m maybe a bit in denial. But also, like, if the death cult fanaticism is there from the top down, then why not set off nukes? That’d be the easiest way to trigger a doomsday scenario. That they (so far, thankfully) aren’t doing that makes me doubt how much of it is true believer at the higher levels of command. I can believe some lower levels are true believers, but I’m doubtful about the top brass.

        If we look at it materially, the top brass has a lot more to lose as cushiness of their life goes and insulation from the consequences of what they order members of the military to do. But if they actually push for “armageddon”, that can fast stop being true.

        That said, maybe both are true to an extent. That the ones at the highest levels of power are more self-preservation than they are death cult, but that there are elements of them that are true believer death cult.