Holy Warriors in National Armies

Thanks to the peculiar combination of Samuel Huntington's clash of civilizations theory and Al-Qaeda's televisual terrorism, we've grown accustomed to thinking of holy wars as battles fought between shadowy non-state actors representing different 'civilizations'. But a recent string of articles indicates a far more complex and dangerous relationship between religion and state-based security forces.
Consider a recent New York Times commentary regarding Israel.

"The officer corps of the elite Golani Brigade is now heavily populated by religious right-wing graduates of the preparatory academies," noted Moshe Halbertal, a Jewish philosophy professor who co-wrote the military code of ethics and who is himself religiously observant but politically liberal. "The religious right is trying to have an impact on Israeli society through the army."
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Closer to home, there have been reports of a disturbingly close relationship between some right-wing Christian groups and U.S. Armed Forces.
"(In the summer of 2007) the Pentagon abruptly announced that it would not be delivering 'freedom packages' to our soldiers in Iraq, as it had originally intended.

What were the packages to contain? Not body armor or home-baked cookies. Rather, they held Bibles, proselytizing material in English and Arabic and the apocalyptic computer game "Left Behind: Eternal Forces" (derived from the series of post-Rapture novels), in which "soldiers for Christ" hunt down enemies who look suspiciously like U.N. peacekeepers."
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There's a lot on the line here, folks. Will battles over land and power get framed as clashes between civilizations? Will the religious right increase their influence over nuclear weapons by rising to the top of the military hierarchy - in Pakistan, Israel, America? Will police forces become instruments of chaos rather than stability in diverse societies?

Here's what's clear: the forces of religious nationalism are no longer content to dress in rags and move in the shadows. Some are seeking uniforms, and a place in the halls of power.

http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/eboo_patel/2009/03/holy_wars.html

This is scarey shit!

Secularists (like Hitchens) and Crusaders are both to blame for this.

When hasn't it been scary shit?

The Crusades? Conquistadors invading the Americas? European religious wars of the Reformation?

There is a reason our founders aimed to separate church and state; and a reason to keep religious nuts from controlling the American military.