Trump’s Unholy Alliance – Risking the Apocalypse for Dollars
In this essay, Paul Jay unravels the alliance of tech billionaires and religious zealots behind the Trump/Vance campaign and their plans to build an American “Iron Dome,” a new ABM system that threatens nuclear war. This exposé reveals why Silicon Valley tycoons like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk are bankrolling a Trump/Vance ticket that promises to make voting obsolete and impose a religious techno-authoritarian state. Does this represent the teachings of Jesus?
Former President Trump has promised the end of electoral democracy. Reuters reports in an article titled “Trump tells Christians they won’t have to vote after this election,” that Trump said, “I love my Christians” and that “in four years, you don’t have to vote again. We’ll have it fixed so good, you’re not gonna have to vote.”
Take him seriously. This is not just another off-the-cuff crazy Trump comment – it’s the vision of the billionaire cabal that guides him.
The Trump/Vance campaign represents a dangerous alliance of tech and finance billionaires, far-right Catholics, evangelical Christian nationalists, and extreme-right Zionists. This coalition could reshape America and the world in ways that echo the darkest days of the 20th century, but with a 21st-century techno spin.
While their agenda includes typical conservative policies like tax cuts for the wealthy and widespread deregulation, at its heart lies more sinister goals: capitalizing on the massive investment opportunity in militarized Artificial Intelligence, defending the interests of fossil fuel companies, and selling Middle-East foreign policy for campaign donations. In other words, risking the Apocalypse for dollars.
The Real Big Scam: Trump’s “American Iron Dome”
While much attention has been given to Trump’s “drill baby drill” climate denial and anti-immigration plan for mass deportation, his promise to build out America’s nuclear arsenal and a “Made in America Iron Dome” could be the most imminent threat, yet it has received little attention.
The Iron Dome is an Anti-Ballistic Missile system. ABMs are claimed to be defensive weapons designed to intercept and destroy incoming Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) before they reach their targets. The concept gained prominence during the Cold War, culminating in President Reagan’s largely discredited Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) in the 1980s, popularly known as “Star Wars.”
Trump’s proposed “American Iron Dome” is essentially a 21st-century revival of this concept, now bolstered by advancements in artificial intelligence and modern computing power.
The Dangers of the Iron Dome
Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) systems, despite being sold to the public as defensive weapons, will actually increase global tensions. Currently, countries with nuclear weapons avoid direct conflict because they fear retaliation.
The only thing worse than Trump’s dome being a multi-billion-dollar money pit that doesn’t work is that it does work. A nation confident in its ABM system will feel protected enough to consider a first strike, upsetting this balance. This will trigger an even more vigorous arms race as other countries rush to improve their weapons to overcome these defenses. Moreover, even advanced ABM systems can’t guarantee protection against a massive nuclear attack, creating a false sense of security. This is why ABM systems are seen as first strike weapons, not a defensive response. In the end, ABM systems will make an unstable world, dangerously more volatile.
The risks of ABM systems were recognized in 1972 when President Nixon and Soviet General Secretary Brezhnev signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, which limited the development and deployment of ABM systems. This treaty was a cornerstone of strategic stability for three decades until President George W. Bush unilaterally abrogated it in 2002, opening the door for more ABM development.
The Trump Iron Dome will be even more dangerous with the integration of AI in command and control. The integration of artificial intelligence into ABM systems introduces severe risks:
- AI’s superhuman speed in decision-making removes crucial human judgment from nuclear strategy.
- Despite their advanced capabilities, AI systems remain prone to errors and can be misled by false data, potentially leading to catastrophic outcomes.
- Most alarmingly, AI-to-AI interactions could occur at speeds and in languages beyond human comprehension or control, potentially escalating conflicts without human intervention.
Launch-on-Warning and AI: A Dangerous Combination
“Launch-on-warning” is a nuclear strategy where a country launches a retaliatory nuclear strike as soon as it detects an incoming attack, before the incoming missiles have reached their targets. As Daniel Ellsberg said, “ICBM launch on warning is the hair-trigger of the Doomsday Machine.” Launch on warning is the current protocol of American nuclear forces.
Combining launch-on-warning with AI-driven ABM systems creates a potentially explosive situation as it drastically reduces decision time, increasing the risk of accidental nuclear war from false alarms.
In this scenario, we could face a situation where AI systems on both sides are engaged in high-stakes brinksmanship, making split-second decisions about nuclear launches based on criteria and communication that humans can neither fully comprehend nor control. The potential for rapid, unstoppable escalation in such a system is far more than zero.
The Misuse of Pro-Worker Rhetoric
The Trump/Vance draconian agenda is dressed up in populist talk about creating more jobs and supposed Christian values. In his speech accepting the Republican nomination for V.P., J.D. Vance declared, “We are done catering to Wall Street; we’ll commit to the working man.” This rhetoric, eerily reminiscent of populist promises past, rings hollow when we consider the reality behind it.
Vance comes from the world of venture capital and is backed by tech billionaire Peter Thiel. Despite his working-class posturing, his ally, Steve Bannon, cut his teeth at Goldman Sachs. This contradiction is not new; it echoes the Nazi Party’s origins as the “German Workers’ Party,” funded by German millionaires like Fritz Thyssen.
Thyssen AG was a massive conglomerate that dominated the German steel industry. Thyssen was an early supporter of Hitler and shared Peter Thiel’s appreciation for rabid nationalist and anti-communist rhetoric. I’m not suggesting that Thiel supports Hitler, and even Thyssen eventually parted ways with the Nazis, but ideologically there is much in common.
Vance’s pro-worker rhetoric was partly developed by his friend Oren Cass, former Mitt Romney advisor and founder of American Compass (a right-wing think tank). He and Vance crafted a vision for a “new capitalism” with a “pro-worker” plan that purports to support stronger unions and higher wages but does not say how this is to be accomplished. Of course, they don’t advocate militant organizing and strike actions by workers, which is where worker power actually comes from. They don’t oppose anti-union “right to work” laws in states that Republicans control.
The Vance vision does not challenge billionaires’ concentrated ownership, which is where their real power lies. Their “new capitalism” rhetoric masks a deeper agenda, revealed by American Compass’s involvement as a sponsor of the ultra-right Project 2025.
Ironically, Wall Street is the big winner in all this—the entity Vance rails against. As a major shareholder in big tech firms, the military-industrial complex, and fossil fuel companies, the finance sector stands to profit immensely from a Trump/Vance administration.
The Far-Right Cabal and the End of Electoral Democracy
You might wonder how this diverse group – including Thiel, an openly gay married man, Musk, a self-proclaimed “free speech absolutist,” and Miriam Adelson, an ultra-Zionist Jewish casino owner – fits into a fanatical Christian alliance. The answer reveals much about the nature of this coalition. Beneath their lofty proclamations, all of them are united in the pursuit of wealth and power. Their shared goal – reshaping state structures to align with their vision of authoritarian technocratic governance – seems to override ideological differences on social issues.
All of them critique or reject the current form of American electoral democracy. Even though it has rewarded them with fabulous wealth, it doesn’t give them the unrestricted freedom and power they desire. Trump has promised them all the deregulation and weakening of federal agencies they dream about.
Steve Bannon, a close Vance advisor, Trump strategist, and alt-right mastermind, brings a potent mix of economic nationalism and Catholic fundamentalism. His goal? Deconstructing the “administrative” state, a vision now infamously detailed in Project 2025. This radical right-wing blueprint for dismantling government institutions (of course, not the military or the police) and imposing hard right “Christian” values is so extreme that even Trump unconvincingly tried to distance himself from it. They want a deregulated pre-New Deal state, unrestricted freedom for the investor class, without losing any of the state’s coercive police powers.
This means not just lower taxes on billionaires, but much weaker anti-trust enforcement on monopolies and a Labor Relations Board that favors corporations over unions. It means back to the “good old days,” as Bannon described it in 2014 where he wrote the days of the rise of the Robber Barons like J.P. Morgan and Rockefeller in the late 19th and early 20th century as the high point of “enlightened capitalism.” Bannon said, “if you look at the leaders of capitalism at that time, when capitalism was, I believe at its highest flower and spreading its benefits to most of mankind, almost all of those capitalists were strong believers in the Judeo-Christian West.”
In other words, God and Jesus would approve of:
- unregulated, unmitigated capitalism when child labor was mostly legal
- the working day was 12-16 hours
- workers could be fired at any time for any reason
- no health insurance or other benefits
- workers were often trapped in debt
- workers who tried to organize were met with violence and intimidation
- racial segregation and discrimination were codified in laws, restricting access to education, employment, housing, and voting.
- thousands of Black Americans were lynched, often without trial or due process, with impunity for the perpetrators
This talk by Bannon was delivered by webcam to a meeting of the Institute for Human Dignity held at the Vatican, which was under the patronage of then Cardinal Burke, a fierce opponent of the progressive reforms advocated by Pope Francis.
Vance converted to Catholicism in 2019, just a year after being taken under the wing of Bannon, who helped him win his Senate seat. Vance’s conversion was proudly reported on the far-right Opus Dei website, signaling his alignment with this influential Catholic organization. This cements Vance’s ties to a powerful, international network of radical right Catholic influence that goes beyond mere religious affiliation and into the realm of political ideology.
ProPublica reports that JD Vance spoke to and joined the Teneo Network in 2018. Leonard Leo is the Network’s chair, a leader of the Federalist Society, and campaigned to get several Supreme Court judges appointed, including Roberts, Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett. Leo is reported to be a member of Opus Dei and leads an intricate network of far-right Christian funders. In his 2018 speech, Vance defended Alex Jones as a truth-teller, justified “white rage” in the military, and believed terrible things in our society are caused by the devil.
On the social-cultural side, this cabal wants a society that resembles “The Handmaid’s Tale,” where men hold absolute power over women’s bodies, lives, and reproductive rights, and in the name of Christ, the government exercises control over citizens, suppressing individual freedom, autonomy, and dissent. It’s more than ironic that tech billionaires that are supposed libertarians can find common ground with such beliefs.
One such billionaire is Peter Thiel, who was a ten-million-dollar funder of Vance’s senate campaign and provides mountains of cash and an ideological foundation to Vance and his allies today. The PayPal billionaire wrote a 2004 essay, “The Straussian Moment,” that argues for technocratic governance by a tech-savvy elite guided by classical philosophy. Thiel suggests that technological progress has created a crisis only solvable by a return to ancient “wisdom,” calling for a new class of philosopher-kings melding technological expertise with classical learning — a vision challenging electoral democracy’s foundations.
In 2009, Thiel wrote an essay published by the Cato Institute titled “The Education of a Libertarian.” In it, he wrote, “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible” and “The 1920s were the last decade in American history during which one could be genuinely optimistic about politics. Since 1920, the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the franchise to women — two constituencies that are notoriously tough for libertarians — have rendered the notion of ‘capitalist democracy’ into an oxymoron.”
See above for how great the politics of the 1920s was for people who were not millionaires.
In his 2018 speech to Teneo Network, Vance said, “I think Peter Thiel is one of the most important sources of non-conventional truth in our society.” He has often credited Thiel as one of the most influential people in his life.
Thiel identifies as a Christian and, although not a Catholic, is credited by Vance for guiding him to his Catholic conversion.
Perhaps Thiel has objectives other than “ancient wisdom.” He is a co-founder and Board Chair of Palantir, an AI company that works closely with the Pentagon. Palantir promises “fielding capabilities to support the war-fighting vision of Joint All-Domain Command and Control.” Palantir is a major defense contractor that is aggressively promoting the militarization of AI. It sounds like Thiel expects to get a piece of the action from Trump’s “American Iron Dome.”
The Coalition of Cuckoos
Elon Musk has pledged millions to Trump/Vance, setting up a super PAC to support Republicans. Musk’s involvement amplifies the alliance’s techno-utopian promises. He presents electric cars as a solution to the climate crisis yet allies with climate science deniers who will undo even the modest measures taken by the Biden administration.
Musk claims his support is because the Republicans are advocates for free speech, which is somewhat of a joke given they are the party of book banning. He also claims the Republicans are more for a meritocracy, ignoring the GOP’s policies that weaken public education. Perhaps, like Thiel, these higher ideals cover what he really wants: the deregulation of his autonomous driving vehicles and his own piece of the action in Trump’s Iron Dome. Don’t forget that Musk’s SpaceX and xAI are also likely to cash in on the Iron Dome boondoggle.
In his August 12th interview with Trump on X, Musk makes an argument for the Iron Dome – “I think people underrate the risk of World War Three. And it’s just that, you know, when looking at the risk of global thermonuclear warfare, it’s game over for humanity.” Of course, he’s right about that, but later in the interview, Musk says the complete opposite, “you know, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed, but now they’re like full cities again. So, it’s really not something that, you know, it’s not as scary as people think, basically.”
So, which is it, “game over” or “not so scary?” “Game over” works to push the Iron Dome, and “not so scary” works to minimize the danger of a nuclear buildout. Perhaps he’s not even aware of how contradictory he is. The whole Trump/Musk conversation is riddled with such inane statements, but that’s par for the course amongst this coalition of cuckoos. It would be comical if a Trump second term wouldn’t have such serious consequences.
Of course, we can’t ignore the fossil fuel industry in this configuration of forces that are rushing us into Armageddon. The Washington Post reported that Trump offered the oil barons, in exchange for a billion-dollar contribution to his campaign, to roll back some of Biden’s signature achievements on clean energy and electric vehicles. At the GOP convention, Trump loudly promised to end EV mandates on day one. This might not seem to fit with Musk’s agenda, but Trump has promised high tariffs on Chinese EVs, and Musk recently said that ending the EV mandate would hurt his competitors more than him.
Another key player in this alliance, is the brilliant, bizarre far-right Catholic billionaire Robert Mercer and his daughter Rebecca. The Mercers were instrumental in Trump’s 2016 victory, introducing Steve Bannon, Kellyanne Conway, and other key figures to the campaign. At the time, Mercer was a major stakeholder in Breitbart News, the far-right media outlet that became a megaphone for Trump’s campaign messaging.
Mercer also put Cambridge Analytica at Trump’s service. Cambridge Analytica was a political consulting firm at the center of a scandal involving the use of personal data from Facebook intended to influence the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The company used a third-party app to collect the data of millions of Facebook users without their knowledge or consent. The data was then used to create targeted political advertisements on Facebook. Steve Bannon was one of its leaders.
The Mercers are deeply embedded in the far-right Catholic network, forming a significant part of this coalition’s ideological and financial backbone.
Best Supporter of Israel Money Can Buy
Another important funder of this bizarre billionaire cabal is Israeli American Miriam Adelson, wife of the now deceased Sheldon Adelson, who together were Trump’s biggest donors in 2016. It was under Adelson’s influence that Trump moved the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, defying the United Nations and the European Union and reversing the policies of every U.S. president, including Clinton, Bush, and Obama. As recently reported by Haaretz newspaper, she has now pledged $100 million in exchange for Trump’s support for Israel’s annexation of the West Bank — a dream of the Israeli far-right.
The Biden administration has provided unrestricted arms to Israel, enabling its onslaught against Gaza, and has been largely ineffective in mitigating the viciousness of the attack on the Palestinian people. It’s unlikely that a Harris administration will differ substantially from Biden, although she has called for a ceasefire.
However, a Trump administration would be even more one-sided in its support for Israel. It would not only give a completely unmitigated free hand to Netanyahu’s government but would likely support an all-out war with Hezbollah and perhaps Iran. It was mostly Republicans that gave Netanyahu over 50 standing ovations when he recently spoke to Congress. It’s difficult to say if it’s significant, but Harris did not attend.
The Road to Trump Was Paved by the Democratic Party
While presenting itself as a radical departure from the status quo, the Trump alliance exploits Democratic Party administrations’ failure to live up to their promises of addressing growing inequality. These policies helped till the soil for the growth of Trumpism.
The leaders of the Democratic Party have their own group of billionaires on whom they depend, including Reid Hoffman, their own member of the “PayPal Mafia,” which also includes Musk and Thiel. Hoffmann is donating large sums to Harris/Walz and is publicly asking her to get rid of Lina Khan at the Federal Trade Commission. Khan has become one of Biden’s most effective and progressive appointments, leading anti-trust suits against Big Tech, including Microsoft. Hoffman is on the board of Microsoft.
Eric Schmidt, former CEO of Google and a Democrat, warns of AI’s existential dangers, yet works with Thiel’s Palantir developing investments in AI militarization.
Despite promising change and hope, Democratic administrations strengthened financial and Big Tech sector power over the years, further concentrating wealth. Some climate and pro-union reforms they passed were significant, but far too limited, given the scale of the problems. The Democratic Party leadership actively opposes more systemic reform.
The Democratic Party claims to defend democracy, but this doesn’t ring true for many people because this formal democracy fails to ensure effective economic and political rights for workers, causing widespread financial insecurity and crushing poverty.
The bottom line for most workers is that life has not improved significantly, especially in rural and suburban areas that have been gutted by deindustrialization, a consequence of free trade and globalization, much of which took place under the Democratic Party.
These policies engendered resentment and anger that fueled the far right.
“I Love My Christians”
As I wrote at the start, Trump says he loves his Christians. The Trump/Vance program is insidiously packaged in Christian language and traditional values. Their invoked faith bears little resemblance to Jesus’s teachings of compassion, care for the poor, and rejection of wealth and power. Jesus said, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God.” He also said, “Sell your possessions and give to the poor.” This is not Trump’s “Make America Wealthy Again.”
Martin Luther King said, “Jesus teaches us to love our enemies, to bless them that curse us, to pray for them that despitefully use us. This is not a popular doctrine, but it is a Christian doctrine.” This is not the message of the Trump/Vance campaign.
We are ruled by a class of billionaires, some dressed in Christian garb, others secular liberalism. Whichever party they back, they are not fit to rule. They believe their wealth makes them immune to what’s coming. They are wrong.
As critical as this election is, the need to deal with the existential threats of climate catastrophe, militarized AI, and the threat of nuclear war goes beyond this vote. A system that allows billionaires to threaten the existence of human civilization must be fundamentally changed.
A victory of the Harris/Walz team is no guarantee we will survive, far from it. A victory of the Trump/Vance far right will almost certainly make that unlikely.
We must speak to the hearts of ordinary people who have been taken in by MAGA’s perverse use of faith to lead people to the slaughter. Do not doubt that climate catastrophe and nuclear war will be a slaughter on a scale not imagined – even in the bible. Trump and Vance are not the path to salvation but the road to ruin.
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