Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is conscripting “Franklin the Turtle” into the War on Drugs. By sharing a parody of the reptile firing on narcotics traffickers, he’s igniting a firestorm online and muddying a serious debate over the military strikes.

On Sunday, Mr. Hegseth tweeted a satirical book titled “Franklin Targets Narco Terrorists” with the caption: “For your Christmas wish list.” The cover showed the titular turtle dressed in combat gear in a scene reminiscent of “Apocalypse Now.”

The image originated with an X account, Maverick Alexander, which states that it’s “mostly satire.” Expect the user’s other titles like “Franklin Questions the Official Story of 9/11” and “Franklin Defends the Border with Force” to keep feeding the news cycle.

Following Mr. Hegseth’s lead, fresh parodies are multiplying across social media at the speed of AI.  Titles include “Franklin Goes to The Hague,” “Franklin On Trial at the ICC,” and “Franklin Goes to Jail.”

Franklin’s publisher, Kids Can Press, condemned all the “unauthorized use” late Monday night. The character, they wrote on X, “stands for kindness, empathy, and inclusivity.” They “strongly condemn any denigrating” or “violent” depictions.

In the version shared by Mr. Hegseth, Franklin grins as he fires rocket-propelled grenades from a helicopter, raining fire on men in the water below. Their boats, laden with packages of what appears to be cocaine, explode.

Opponents of the strikes maintain that appearances can be deceiving. Alleged narcotics traffickers, they argue, ought not be summarily executed but, absent a declaration of war, afforded due process.

In a joint statement on Saturday, the Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Roger Wicker of Mississippi, and his Democratic colleague, Jack Reed of Rhode Island, said that they’d be “conducting vigorous oversight to determine the facts.”

The bipartisan statement reflects broad concerns about the escalation in the Caribbean. But enter Franklin, deflating drama with comic relief and complicating the task of shifting public opinion against the Pentagon.

Deploying Franklin helped advance Mr. Hegseth’s defense of a report that he’d ordered military personnel to “kill everybody,” including men in the water, after their boats had been disabled.

Sunday on X, Mr. Hegseth called the report “fake news” intended to “discredit” the military, insisting he gave no such order. “Our current operations in the Caribbean,” he wrote, “are lawful under both U.S. and international law.”

Senator Charles Schumer, the Democratic leader in the upper chamber, tried casting the Franklin parody as proof of Mr. Hegseth’s unfitness. “I have never seen,” he said, retweeting the parody, “someone so unserious, so childish, and so obviously insecure.”

Other Democrats followed suit. Senator Christopher Murphy of Connecticut called Mr. Hegseth “a national embarrassment,” the same phrase used by Mr. Schumer. “Resign,” said Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal of Washington. “You are a war criminal.”

A Democratic candidate for Congress in New York, Jose Vega, posted that “if elected,” he’ll “ensure that Pete Hegseth gets brought to trial for war crimes.” As the outrage reaches a crescendo, the debate over militarizing the fight against the cartels fades.

We live in an age in which all topics seem to devolve, if one waits long enough, into absurdity — and it helps if someone at the White House gives them a push. No weighty statement, it seems, can compete with Franklin for entertainment value.

A similar trolling tactic is being used at anti-ICE protests. In October, a man donned a frog costume, as this columnist wrote for the Sun, rendering ICE “ridiculous” and stripping Antifa “of the menace” that the Trump Administration attributes to them.

It’s hard to take any issue with the gravity it deserves when costumed “furries” and anthropomorphic turtles are involved. Every moment spent talking about them is one not spent on things like the Constitution or the War Powers Act.