There have been few sanctuaries of American values as steadfast as the American armed forces. "Duty, Honor, Country". "Semper Fidelis". "Service Before Self". "Honor, Courage, Commitment". "This We'll Defend". "Semper Paratus". These are words that denote selfless dedication to a higher calling than the gratification of one's own desires. The men and women who have served our country in the past, and who serve now, are without a doubt the finest of us. They are the face of America around the world, and we are blessed beyond measure that they serve our country with such grace and courage under the worst of external conditions.

Presently, however, they are under threat from within, and one cannot help but notice that our military is being forced, against centuries of American tradition, morals and example, to become a reflection of the left. This appears to be part of the plan to fundamentally transform the United States, and it carries dire consequences for our long-term survival.

Until recently, the military had seemed able to preserve its traditions and principles against radical outside influences. This was due largely to the fact that members voluntarily surrendered their self-interest. By enlisting, they accepted the limits and code of the service they joined, and implicitly made their individuality secondary to the greater good. When asked after the Civil War to bless a woman's infant son, Robert E. Lee also told her, "Teach him he must deny himself."

Now, along with every other aspect of our nation, our armed forces are being radicalized. Political correctness, social experimentation, and religious bigotry are jeopardizing the mission and cohesiveness of the military, and putting the long-term security of our country at risk. The left has happily made the military, which it loathes, a target of liberal social change. In addition to making service uncomfortable for some of those already in the ranks, these changes threaten to discourage those who might otherwise have joined from doing so. In an all-volunteer force, this is predictably fatal.

Major Nidal Hassan was an overt jihadist, but political correctness pervading the Army enabled him to claim 13 lives. Those 13, who gave themselves voluntarily to the service of our country, were sacrificed instead to "tolerance" and "multiculturalism", which suppressed alarms over Hassan's fervor out of fear of retribution for telling the truth about a Muslim who openly raged against the United States. As this administration has welcomed the influence of radical Islamists at all levels of government, we learn that training materials about our enemies are being prepared and edited by the enemy's domestic agents. For any who fail to grasp that labeling the Fort Hood massacre "workplace violence" upheld the liberal sacrament of political correctness, one need only know that General Casey bemoaned the effect that this jihadi mass murder would have upon the Army's diversity efforts.

More recently, it has been decided that the military's mission includes openly celebrating its gay members. In each and every pursuit undertaken by rational people working toward some larger purpose, the first question asked about any policy should be, "How does this advance the mission of the organization?" If the mission of the military was to reflect all aspects of liberal utopia, which is merely philosophical and transient, celebrating lifestyle choices would be a 'no-brainer'. But the military's mission is not enhanced by celebrating the subjective preferences of its individual members.

Our gay service men and women are just as brave and just as commendable for their self-sacrifice as our straight service men and women, but the mission of the military is not to applaud and validate their lifestyle choices. Nor should they seek it. It doesn't advance the mission, unless the mission is to weaken the whole by celebrating the diversity of its component parts, and to accord preferential treatment to those subjectively deemed by the left to be socially virtuous.

Indeed, this has been the track record generally of "diversity". It is a tool of division, enabling those who exploit it to pit one group against another for some political purpose, or to extend special treatment. Our president openly speaks of other Americans as "enemies", manipulating diversity to inflame passions.

Now, the left has targeted religious belief for special attention and examples of overt bigotry within the military have recently come to light. A recent briefing to an Army Reserve unit in Pennsylvania equated Christianity, including Evangelists and Catholics, with terrorist organizations such as Hamas and al Qaeda. The president has also stated that a conscience protection for military chaplains against ceremonies that violate their beliefs is "unnecessary and ill-advised". All must bow to the agenda, you see. It is their god.

This country was founded in large part by Christian men and women. Because the left's reign is the antithesis of Christian values, those who still espouse them are a threat to those in power. Branding entirely nonviolent groups as "extremists" achieves the same goal as labeling one's opponent a racist. Christians who do no objective harm must be defamed as zealously as any other political enemy. Those who kill eagerly to honor their faith, however, embody "peace" and should be rewarded with unilateral control over what can be said about them. That our troops are being thus radicalized should alarm every American.

Will some leave the military as it becomes hostile to basic religious beliefs? Of course. Will some rethink their desire to enlist in the first place in an organization that is inhospitable to their own faith, or the country's founding principles? No doubt. That's the point. Just as we will see the ranks of doctors shrink under ObamaCare, we will see our military diminish as fewer stay or join. When the military ceases being about service to our nation and becomes a liberal petri dish for every social experiment the left can concoct, we will finally be the neutered former superpower the left has longed for.

We are witnessing the purposeful destabilization and poisoning of our military from within. The left has long despised our military as the face of America's imagined oppression and imperialism. Just ask John Kerry. As the military goes, so goes the country. Our enemies are watching us, and they like what they see.