Reflecting on my life, I can recount a series of wars that have transpired. I was born during the Vietnam conflict and came of age in the Cold War. In fact, my own initial training in the Air Force was focused on the great Soviet threat, and my POW training was based on the American experience in Vietnam.
While I was in high school, America first became embroiled in the Middle East unrest fomented by the Islamic Republic of Iran. Then, I watched as small conflicts erupted closer to home in Panama and even Grenada. Other skirmishes followed in places like Libya, Kosovo, and Somalia. By the early 1990s, even as the Cold War cooled, the focus turned once again to the Middle East, with multiple wars centered on Iraq and then Afghanistan. My own combat experience came over the deserts and mountains of both of those forlorn nations.
The point is that wars and rumors of wars have been the rule rather than the exception—even as the ramifications of those wars have grown increasingly consequential with the advent of nuclear weapons, cyberattacks, and bioterrorism. Far from the tranquil “New World Order” advocated by globalists 30 years ago, threats and dangers seem to be multiplying all around us.
The current conflict with Iran is indicative of the dilemma we face. Although the conflict with Iran has churned up new risks and tremendous disruptions (not just in oil prices and supply chains, but to livelihoods and even innocent lives subject to indiscriminate Iranian attacks), it seeks to eliminate a far greater threat: a nuclear-armed Iran. There is little doubt that if the ayatollahs, mullahs, and radicalized militants of Iran possessed a nuclear weapon, they would unleash it on Israel and American forces throughout the region.
Scoffers and anti-American agitators (including some in Congress) would ask why any nation—including a despotic regime in Iran—would utilize a weapon that would certainly lead to their own nation’s utter destruction. There are two reasons for their fanaticism, and both are urgent to our contemporary situation, reflective of a timeless struggle, and omens of another war that will soon rage in the heavens. Those reasons are:
1. Iran’s Shiite Muslim leaders are dedicated to an eschatology that anticipates a Muslim messiah.
2. Since Daniel’s day, Iran (then known as Persia) has been under the oversight of a powerful demon who serves the will of his infernal master, Satan.
Let’s break down these two dynamics.
The Supposed Twelfth Mahdi
Many Americans, and even most Christians, have a hard time distinguishing between Sunni and Shiite Muslims. And, they tend to think that Muslims throughout the Middle East are Arab. Both are gravely mistaken.
In a nutshell, Sunni Muslims (who are dominant in most Arab countries, such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan) insist that the line of succession from Mohammed rightfully falls to exalted leaders (called Caliphs) who demonstrate their merit. Shias believe that Islamic leaders (Imams) must trace their lineage to Mohammed himself. This divergence alone traces back to shortly after Mohammed’s death in the 7th century.
More importantly, Shia Muslims believe that the 12th Imam (Mahdi) in the line of succession was uniquely gifted. They assert that he did not die but went into hiding, awaiting a moment in human history when an existential crisis will force his reemergence to usher in a final Muslim Khilāfah(Caliphate) over a global Muslim community (or Ummah). The fervency of this belief has motivated Shiite Muslims to extreme acts of terror and chaos, in the belief that they are accelerating the chaos necessary to cause the Mahdi to return.
Tellingly, the radical clerics who have controlled Iran for 47 years are willing to attack their Muslim neighbors and even impoverish or destroy their own people in pursuit of this warped ideology. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad often spoke in apocalyptic terms about the Iranian motivation regarding the Mahdi when he addressed the United Nations (from 2005-13). In his very first address in 2005, he said he felt a spiritual presence encompassing him and rendering the assembled delegates spellbound during his 28-minute speech. Although ridiculed by contemporary politicians, Ahmadinejad revealed something quite factual—and diabolical.
