Huntington’s thesis thrived on political expediency, not scholarly rigor.

Evidence

Huntington’s theory did not gain resonance because of its intellectual rigor; he was, after all, scathingly denigrated by scholars within political science, law, and other academic disciplines. Rather, his theory gained momentum because of its political expediency on two key fronts: first, because it filled the void for a new geopolitical nemesis left by the Soviet Union; and second, because Huntington’s simplified construction of a menacing Islamic civilization was deeply familiar, having already been embedded within the collective American imagination and the halls of power. — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 236

Categorization

• XREF: The ‘void left by the Soviet Union’ parallels arguments about the manufactured enemy in Marx-era and Cold War literature the reader keeps.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 236