Donald Trump rode into office—twice now—on a wave of promises to upend the Washington consensus, to drain the swamp of its self-serving mandarins and to keep America out of endless wars. His base cheered when he skewered the neoconservative architects of Iraq and Afghanistan, wars that bled our Treasury, and most importantly, many of our sons for little more than bragging rights in Beltway and Tel Aviv salons.

American neocon messianism has a particularly notorious trait: the United States of America feels itself to be the savior of the world, therefore self-justifying any actions on a global scale.