Whatever Happened to “Bitcoin, Not Bombs”

With the United States now at war with Iran, I keep thinking about an older argument from the Bitcoin movement.

Wasn’t Bitcoin supposed to be part of the anti-war movement?

Early Bitcoin culture was not only about getting rich, ETFs, corporate treasuries, or governments building strategic reserves. Bitcoin was presented as a way to challenge the monetary system that makes endless war possible.

The basic argument was simple:
Governments can wage wars that voters would never support if they had to pay the full cost immediately through higher taxes. Instead, wars are financed through debt, monetary expansion, and inflation. The costs are spread across decades and hidden inside higher prices, interest payments, and a weaker currency.

Bitcoin was supposed to change that equation.
A fixed-supply, politically neutral form of money would theoretically make it harder for governments to create money, quietly expand debt, and pass the cost of war onto future generations.
Bitcoin would not make war impossible. But it could make the cost of war more visible.

Yet during the Iran war, much of Bitcoin culture seems strangely silent. The conversation is mostly about whether oil prices will push Bitcoin higher, whether governments will buy more Bitcoin, and whether war will become another bullish catalyst.
That feels like a major cultural shift.

Bitcoin began as an attempt to separate money from state power. Now parts of the movement seem more interested in getting Bitcoin adopted by the same governments, financial institutions, and military powers it was originally supposed to constrain.
Maybe Bitcoin itself has not changed. The network remains neutral. But the culture around it has.

So here is the uncomfortable question:
Did Bitcoin fail as an anti-war movement—or did Bitcoiners simply stop caring about the anti-war part once the price started going up?