John Bolton

John Bolton's war face

“”The critical oil and natural gas producing region that we fought so many wars to try and protect our economy from the adverse impact of losing that supply or having it available only at very high prices.

—John Bolton during an interview with Fox News

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The empires strike back

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Veni, vidi, vici

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John Robert "Bomb Iran" Bolton II (1948–) is the former National Security Adviser of the United States and former US Ambassador to the United Nations, among many other dreadful titles. He is also a huge wingnut, whose foreign policy is best described as Jeane Kirkpatrick on steroids. He is "the hawk's hawk". Bolton is one of the most vocal advocates for war with Iran, Venezuela, North Korea, and any other "rogue states". He has been known to sabotage peace talks to "prove" peace doesn't work. Bolton was a supporter of the Vietnam War, but conveniently avoided going overseas by getting a student deferment followed by enlistment in the National Guard (much in common with his later boss Dubya) and later the Army Reserve. Thus making him worthy of the chickenhawk title. He was also an early supporter of the Iraq War, and two decades later, had no regrets.

He has worked, in some capacity, in every Republican administration since the Reagan era — he was an Assistant Attorney General for Ronnie himself, he was an Assistant Secretary of State for Bush the elder, and Ambassador to the UN under his inept son. The last was the most controversial of those three — the Democrats actually filibustered it. Perhaps worse, however, was his (March 2018 to September 2019) tenure as a National Security Adviser under Donald Trump. Like most unelected functionaries GOP presidents treat like hand-me-downs, he is a neoconservative. Despite usually being labeled a neocon, he dislikes being called one. He was formerly a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), and contributed several articles for them.

Unsurprisingly, despite supporting the Vietnam War, he joined the National Guards specifically to make sure he didn't have to serve.

Bombing the campaign finance laws

Early in Bolton's career as a lawyer, he helped move America towards legally recognized corporate personhood with the SCOTUS case Buckley v. Valeo (decided 1976) "that strict limits on campaign spending violated the right to free speech." The Lever reports "this U.S. Supreme Court case was the first to frame the fight against campaign finance regulations as a crusade for free speech and third-party rights." It overturned laws passed after Watergate with the intention of curtailing political corruption, something then-recent events certainly wouldn't have illustrated the necessity of. Or so said the wise and honorable Supreme Court. The Buckley v. Valeo case would ultimately serve as a precursor to further cases, including Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, and Bolton himself had predicted in 1976 that the case would have "profound influence on the structure of American politics". In 2008, he wrote in a memoir: "Everyone knew the decision in Buckley v. Valeo could determine the election in 1976, not to mention the future shape of American politics."

Countries he'd like to bomb

If you see him adjusting his glasses for the cameras, that's him showing off his Yale University class ring. He's very proud of it.

Iraq

Bolton was an ardent supporter of the illegal war in Iraq, even being dubbed one of its architects. He has stated that despite the failures of the Iraq War, he’d repeat it again too.

The instability following the invasion of Iraq is also notable for directly enabling the rise of DAESH as a result of the power vacuum left in the wake of the collapse of the Ba'athist regime. Within weeks of the invasion American troops went from being seen as "heroic liberators" to "brutal occupiers." The US, in a prime display of incompetence, also disbanded the Iraqi Army. That left uncountable numbers of angry, unemployed men with military training just waiting for a chance to strike back at the Americans and their perceived puppet regime. DAESH was all too willing to seize the opportunity that the US had stupidly created for them. Many of DAESH's top commanders were identified as senior military officers in Saddam Hussein's Iraqi Army.

The US military also detained tens of thousands at Camp Bucca in Southern Iraq, many of whom were noncombatants. This created an atmosphere of resentment among the inmates that was a keen environment for radicalization and recruitment, as well as a space to plan attacks and coordinate and establish insurgent infrastructure right under the American noses. Notable among the inmates was a certain Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who established himself as a leading figure among the newly radicalized detainees.

Syria

Much like with Iraq, Bolton sees invading Syria as a good move for American foreign policy and influence. However, ironically enough, his decision to shift the foreign policy of the administration from the internal debates of the entire staff towards whatever Donald Trump wanted likely ended up being the reason Trump withdrew from Syria in 2019.

Libya

The Bush Administration had to specifically keep Bolton out of the loop regarding their deal with Muammar Gaddafi in order to actually make sure said deal went through, primarily due to Bolton's opposition to such a deal. Unsurprisingly, he was a firm supporter of the NATO bombing campaign against Libya in 2011.

Iran

“”The only thing that will stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons is regime change in Tehran.

—Bolton after a 2009 vote by the UN Security Council to impose sanctions on Tehran for its nuclear program.

Bolton has had "[the] anal focus on Iran for twenty years," said H.R. McMaster.

Bolton has repeatedly called for a regime change in Iran, going as far as to give a speech regarding this subject to young Iranians at a conference in Paris. He has constantly claimed that every action from the Iranian government is an act of terrorism, despite embodying that himself by calling for assassinating Iranian leaders and toppling the government. While working for Donald Trump, he was one of three forces that stopped the President from opening up diplomatic relations with Iran.

In 2004, Bolton claimed while testifying to Congress that Iran had a greater amount of enriched uranium than they were claiming--which the IAEA was unable to get any evidence to support.

War games conducted in 2002 showed Iran decisively beating America in combat, meaning that, according to the simulation conducted by the Pentagon in 2002, war with Iran is not only costly, but a losing proposition. To quote National Interest:

It was designed by the Joint Forces Command over the course of two years. It had 13,500 participants, numerous live and simulated training sites, and was supposed to pit an Iran-like Middle Eastern country against the U.S. military, which would be fielding advanced technology it didn't plan to implement until five years later.

The war game would begin with a forced-entry exercise that included the 82nd Airborne and the 1st Marine Division. When the blue forces issued a surrender ultimatum, Van Riper, commanding the red forces, turned them down. Since the Bush Doctrine of the period included preemptive strikes against perceived enemies, Van Riper knew the blue forces would be coming for him. And they did.

But the three-star general didn't spend 41 years in the Marine Corps by being timid. As soon as the Navy was beyond the point of no return, he hit them and hit them hard. Missiles from land-based units, civilian boats, and low-flying planes tore through the fleet as explosive-ladened speedboats decimated the Navy using suicide tactics. His code to initiate the attack was a coded message sent from the minarets of mosques at the call to prayer.

In less than 10 minutes, the whole thing was over and Lt. Gen. Paul Van Riper was victorious.

Micah Zenko, writing a piece for War on the Rocks in 2015, explained why this was so shocking:

The impact of the [opposing force’s] ability to render a U.S. carrier battle group — the centerpiece of the U.S. Navy — militarily worthless stunned most of the MC ’02 participants.

The shock of this compelled the exercise planners to rig the results for the US for the rest of the simulation. Perhaps we should listen to the actual experts on this, and not a hawkish coward with a track-record of advocating for disastrous military interventions.

DAESH has also launched a number of attacks in Iran over the years, and have a strong presence just over the border in Afghanistan. DAESH and a litany of other militant groups dissatisfied with the reign of the Khomeinist regime are just waiting for the Ayatollahs to fall. If there is one sound argument against invading Iran, this is it.

Iran is also an "industrial autarky" that produces more steel than any EU member state besides Germany. In addition to that, Iran "has the capacity to feed itself, enjoys an abundance of fossil fuels (whose sale, as with Russia, has blunted the effectiveness of US sanctions), and has an impressive military-industrial complex." Iran also is a nation with 90 million people and is the "size of Germany, France, and Ukraine combined."

Due to the potential refugee crisis caused by any hypothetical "Iran War," a war with Iran would be an unmitigated disaster for Europe. Syria has produced 6.8 million refugees out of a pre-war population of 22 million. How many refugees would be generated by a conflict in a country with 90 million people?

North Korea

Bolton spoke positively of engaging in a pre-emptive strike against North Korea in 2018. Any potential war with North Korea could result in potentially hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of casualties. North Korea has artillery entrenched deep into their country that points directly at Seoul, the capital of South Korea, that while unlikely to "flatten" Seoul, could still cause massive collateral damage to the city. North Korea is also a nuclear power; possessing, according to the Council for Foreign Relations, enough material to make 100 nuclear bombs and has already engaged in several successful launches of nuclear rocketry. North Korea is also suspected to possess weapons of mass destruction unrelated to its nuclear status, including both chemical and biological weapons.

From a purely military standpoint, war with North Korea would again be a both costly and disastrous endeavor. This is ignoring any potential humanitarian pitfalls of war with the North Korean regime, of which there are many. Given that Bolton openly and unashamedly advocates for such a stupid policy position, it's downright frightening that this guy has been in the highest levels of government since the Reagan era.

Morever, Bolton brags about participating to the collapse of the Agreed Framework. The Agreed Framework successfully controlled the North Korean nuclear program. When a separate enriched uranium program was discovered, instead of using it for further leverage, Bolton pushed for the collapse of the agreement in 2003 (“This was the hammer I had been looking for to shatter the Agreed Framework”), causing North Korea to leave the NPT and, three years later, to test its first nuclear weapons.

Cuba

Bolton has claimed that Cuba has a secret biological weapons program and has worked with both Iran and Libya, both of which the State Department were forced to deny.

Venezuela

During the 2019 political instability in Venezuela and Bolton's tenure in the Trump administration, he "accidentally" flashed a notepad "the wrong way" so the media could snap photos of what it said: "5,000 troops to Colombia". This was a microcosm of a wider strategy Bolton seemingly deployed throughout his role in the Trump presidency: make the media think the administration's position was much more hawkish than it was to bait the press into confronting Trump himself about whatever Bolton said the day before — gambling that this might pigeonhole Trump into defending Bolton's own position. Luckily, this sneaky gambit rarely seems to have actually worked, and no troops were ever deployed to Colombia. Trump sort-of caught on to the way that Bolton was contradicting him on many issues, which contributed to his removal as an advisor.

Institutions he'd like to bomb

United Nations

Despite having been the US ambassador to the United Nations, he infamously once claimed in 1994 that the UN "doesn't exist." This was long before he conveniently became appointed as a politician within the UN.

International Criminal Court

“”Renouncing the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court was the happiest moment of my government service.

—

Bolton has also heavily criticized the ICC, which is not surprising given his support of war crimes committed by the United States in the various foreign territories where they exerted themselves.

Biological Weapons Convention

In a 2001 biological weapons conference in Geneva convened to endorse a UN proposal to enforce the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention, Bolton opposed it, fearing it would led to spot inspections of suspected U.S. weapons sites.

European Union

Unsurprisingly for someone supporting the return to jungle's law in international relations, Bolton opposes the European Union and praised Brexit.

Other highlights

• While working for Ronald Reagan, he opposed giving financial reparations to Japanese-Americans who had been placed in the Internment Camps of the mid-1940s.

• He was involved with the Iran-Contra scandal.