John Bolton Quotes

On Rachel's show for November 7, 2012: We're not going to have a supreme court that will overturn Roe versus Wade. There will be no more Antonio Scalias and Samuel Aleatos added to this court. We're not going to repeal health reform. Nobody is going to kill medicare and make old people in this generation or any other generation fight it out on the open market to try to get health insurance. We are not going to do that. We are not going to give a 20% tax cut to millionaires and billionaires and expect programs like food stamps and kid's insurance to cover the cost of that tax cut. We'll not make you clear it with your boss if you want to get birth control under the insurance plan that you're on. We are not going to redefine rape. We are not going to amend the United States constitution to stop gay people from getting married. We are not going to double Guantanamo. We are not eliminating the Department of Energy or the Department of Education or Housing at the federal level. We are not going to spend $2 trillion on the military that the military does not want. We are not scaling back on student loans because the country's new plan is that you should borrow money from your parents. We are not vetoing the Dream Act. We are not self-deporting. We are not letting Detroit go bankrupt. We are not starting a trade war with China on Inauguration Day in January. We are not going to have, as a president, a man who once led a mob of friends to run down a scared, gay kid, to hold him down and forcibly cut his hair off with a pair of scissors while that kid cried and screamed for help and there was no apology, not ever. We are not going to have a Secretary of State John Bolton. We are not bringing Dick Cheney back. We are not going to have a foreign policy shop stocked with architects of the Iraq War. We are not going to do it. We had the chance to do that if we wanted to do that, as a country. and we said no, last night, loudly.

post hoc, ergo propter hoc” (“after this, therefore because of this”),

want real loyalty. I want him to kiss my ass in Macy’s window at high noon and tell me it smells like roses.

Trump is Trump. I came to understand that he believed he could run the Executive Branch and establish national-security policies on instinct, relying on personal

There are many who reject the opinions of these days as errors because they will not be troubled to search and examine whether they are truths or not. We are commanded to try all things (1 Thessalonians 5:21); and how can we be grounded and established in the truth, or know truth from error, if we do not search the mind of God and learn His mind and will? 1 John 4:1: “Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits, whether they be of God or not.” Many a truth is rejected in these days because many an error is entertained… It is not enough to say, with Pilate, “What is truth?” and then sit still, as many ask questions for discourse’s sake rather than out of a desire to be satisfied; but you must search the mind of God and inquire diligently.

Trump generally had only two intelligence briefings per week, and in most of those, he spoke at greater length than the briefers, often on matters completely unrelated to the subjects at hand.

The right way to impose sanctions is to do so swiftly and unexpectedly; make them broad and comprehensive, not piecemeal; and enforce them rigorously, using military assets to interdict illicit commerce if necessary.

Even twenty months into the Trump presidency, new appointees and new policies were not yet in place. If it were still early 2017, the problem might have been understandable, but it was sheer malpractice that bureaucratic inertia persisted in such critical policy areas.

Trump is Trump. I came to understand that he believed he could run the Executive Branch and establish national-security policies on instinct, relying on personal relationships with foreign leaders, and with made-for-television showmanship always top of mind. Now, instinct, personal relations, and showmanship are elements of any President’s repertoire. But they are not all of it, by a long stretch. Analysis, planning, intellectual discipline and rigor, evaluation of results, course corrections, and the like are the blocking and tackling of presidential decision-making, the unglamorous side of the job. Appearance takes you only so far.

He then, stunningly, turned the conversation to the coming US presidential election, alluding to China’s economic capability to affect the ongoing campaigns, pleading with Xi to ensure he’d win. He stressed the importance of farmers, and increased Chinese purchases of soybeans and wheat in the electoral outcome. I would print Trump’s exact words, but the government’s prepublication review process has decided otherwise.

It is difficult beyond description to pursue a complex policy in a contentious part of the world when the policy is subject to instant modification based on the boss’s perception of how inaccurate and often-already-outdated information is reported by writers who don’t have the Administration’s best interests at heart in the first place. It was like making and executing policy inside a pinball machine, not the West Wing of the White House.

Kim asked how Trump assessed him, and Trump answered that he loved that question. He saw Kim as really smart, quite secretive, a very good person, totally sincere, with a great personality. Kim said that in politics, people are like actors. Trump was correct on one point. Kim Jong Un knew just what he was doing when he asked what Trump thought of him; it was a question designed to elicit a positive response, or risk ending the meeting right there. By asking a seemingly naïve or edgy question, Kim actually threw the burden and risk of answering on the other person. It showed he had Trump hooked.

When the situation was manageable, it was neglected, and now that it is thoroughly out of hand, we apply too late the remedies which then might have effected a cure. There is nothing new in the story. It is as old as the Sibylline books. It falls into that long, dismal catalogue of the fruitlessness of experience, and the confirmed unteachability of mankind. Want of foresight, unwillingness to act when action would be simple and effective, lack of clear thinking, confusion of counsel until emergency comes, until self-preservation strikes its jarring gong—these are the features which constitute the endless repetition of history.

Donald Trump repeatedly promised he would hire "the best people." He did not. That is not my opinion; it is President Trump's, which he expresses frequently. Trump has said that his first secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, was "dumb as a rock" and "lazy as hell." His attorney general, Jeff Sessions, was "scared stiff and Missing in Action," "didn't have a clue," and "should be ashamed of himself." Trump described one of his assistants, Omarosa Manigault Newman, as "wacky," "deranged," "vicious, but not smart," a "crazed, crying lowlife," and finally a "dog." After lasting only eleven days as communications director, Anthony Scaramucci "was quickly terminated 'from' a position that he was totally incapable of handling" and was called "very much out of control." An anonymous adviser to the president was called "a drunk/drugged-up loser." Chief strategist Steve Bannon was "sloppy," a "leaker," and "dumped like a dog by almost everyone." His longtime lawyer Michael Cohen was "TERRIBLE," "hostile," "a convicted liar & fraudster," and a "failed lawyer." The president was "Never a big fan!" of his White House counsel Don McGahn and "not even a little bit happy" with Jerome Powell, his selection to head the Federal Reserve, whom he called an "enemy." His third national security advisor, John Bolton, was mocked as a "tough guy [who] got us into Iraq." When the president was irritated with his former chief of staff, John Kelly, the president's press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, declared that Kelly "was totally unequipped to handle the genius of our great president.

I felt sick that a stray tweet could actually result in a meeting, although I took some solace from believing that what motivated Trump was the press coverage and photo op of this unprecedented DMZ get-together, not anything substantive. Trump had wanted to have one of the earlier summits at the DMZ, but that idea had been short-circuited because it gave Kim Jong Un the home-court advantage (whereas we would fly halfway around the world), and because we still hadn’t figured out how to ensure it was just a Trump-Kim bilateral meeting. Now it was going to happen. North Korea had what it wanted from the United States and Trump had what he wanted personally. This showed the asymmetry of Trump’s view of foreign affairs. He couldn’t tell the difference between his personal interests and the country’s interests.

Since September 11, 2001, we have constructed and identified a new satanic enemy, radical Islam. Rather than concentrate on those who perpetuated the horrors of 9/11, a broad brush was employed to demonize all who stood in the way of Empire. Not surprisingly, former president George W. Bush gave us, during his 2002 State of the Union address, the term "axis of evil," which included the countries of Iraq, Iran, and North Korea. It would take only a few months before the list was expanded. Warning that the U.S. stood ready to take action, then Under Secretary of State and future U.S. representative to the United Nations, John Bolton, added three more countries to the "axis of evil" list in his May 2002 speech, "Beyond the Axis of Evil." The countries added were Cuba, Libya, and Syria. Yet enemies of Empire and God need not be the only ones defined as evil. Anyone who questions U.S. exceptionalism or supremacy finds themselves labeled as Satan's mouthpiece. Academics, liberals, and politicians (including presidents) have all been portrayed in demonic terms for going against the prevailing mindset that equates America with that "shining city upon the hill." Unfortunately, such characterizations only stifle constructive discourse. [...] [W]e are left wondering whether humanity would have been better served if there had been no such figure as Satan, the personification of absolute Evil. How many so-called witches might not have been burned? How many holy crusades to rid the world of evil would have been averted? What if, instead, Satan was to be understood differently? What if Satan, or absolute Evil, played a different role in determining moral agency?

It was done with a tinge of embarrassment, referred to lightly as “the tin cup exercise,” but it had worked, and no one suggested it was dishonorable. There was no reason it might not work again.

Pompeo said to me alone, “I have no value added on this. This is complete chaos,” which was true for both of us. But the next thing I knew, Trump had signed the “formal” letter of invitation that the North Koreans had asked for. Pompeo had succumbed yet again.

While we were milling around, Trump asked me how we could be “sanctioning the economy of a country that’s seven thousand miles away.” I answered, “Because they are building nuclear weapons and missiles that can kill Americans.” “That’s a good point,” he agreed. We walked over to where Pompeo was standing, and Trump said, “I just asked John why we were sanctioning seven thousand miles away, and he had a very good answer: because they could blow up the world.” “Yes, sir,” said Pompeo. Another day at the office.

Trump couldn’t stop himself: “I’m a talker, I like to talk.” Grand strategy in the Trump Administration.

reflected his view that if you pretended bad things hadn’t happened, perhaps no one else would notice.

Trump broke in to say, “Even our enemies liked that we didn’t attack.” (No kidding!) “We have capital accumulated. It was the most presidential act in decades. It worked out very well.

Trump’s deathless belief that everyone wanted to talk to him, that everyone was “dying for a deal.

The transition’s spreading disorder increasingly reflected not just organizational failures but Trump’s essential decision-making style. Charles Krauthammer, a sharp critic of his, told me he had been wrong earlier to characterize Trump’s behavior as that of an eleven-year-old boy. “I was off by ten years,” Krauthammer remarked. “He’s like a one-year-old. Everything is seen through the prism of whether it benefits Donald Trump.” That was certainly the way the personnel-selection process appeared from the outside. As one Republican strategist told me, the best way to become Secretary of State was to “try to be the last man standing.

Hannity is just one member of this crazy cable news cabinet. While he deserved credit for getting longtime Fox News commentator John Bolton hired as national security advisor, Carlson got the credit when Bolton eventually fell out of favor with Trump. The sacking of Jeff Sessions? Jeanine Pirro was in Trump’s ear for that one. The resignation of Kirstjen Nielsen? Lou Dobbs was central in it. Pat Cipollone leading the president’s legal team? Laura Ingraham was instrumental. But

the asymmetry of Trump’s view of foreign affairs. He couldn’t tell the difference between his personal interests and the country’s interests.

If he said it enough times, perhaps it would become true.

I suppose I really thought, “If he wants to put something out that foolish, who am I to object?

Trumpworld,

Hard pounding, this, gentlemen. Let’s see who will pound the longest. —THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON, RALLYING HIS TROOPS AT WATERLOO, 1815

this one almost certainly thermonuclear,

privileges

negotiating with themselves to see if they could produce a smile

When the situation was manageable, it was neglected, and now that it is thoroughly out of hand, we apply too late the remedies which then might have effected a cure. There is nothing new in the story. It is as old as the Sibylline books. It falls into that long, dismal catalogue of the fruitlessness of experience, and the confirmed unteachability of mankind. Want of foresight, unwillingness to act when action would be simple and effective, lack of clear thinking, confusion of counsel until emergency comes, until self-preservation strikes its jarring gong—these are the features which constitute the endless repetition of history.2

Trump said he had known from his first day in office that, for him, deal-making or negotiating such as this summit would be easy.

When we come to the events of summer 2019, and the shooting down of US drones and other belligerent Iranian acts in the region, remember well these Administration failures to respond to the provocations one year earlier.

His personal take on the Russian leader remained a mystery.

Thucydides’s famous observation that “fear, honor and interest” are the main drivers of international politics and ultimately war.

Most important of all, [US military presence in Afghanistan] wasn’t a war about making Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, or any other country nicer, safer places to live. I am not a nation builder. I do not believe what is, after all, an essentially Marxist analysis that a better economic way of life will divert people from terrorism. This was about keeping America safe from another 9/11, or even worse, a 9/11 where the terrorists had nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons. As long as the threat existed, no place was too far away to worry about. The terrorists weren’t coming to America on wooden sailing ships.

Most important of all, [US military presence in Afghanistan] wasn’t a war about making Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, or any other country nicer, safer places to live. I am not a nation builder. I do not believe what is, after all, an essentially Marxist analysis that a better economic way of life will divert people from terrorism. This was about keeping America safe from another 9/11, or even worse, a 9/11 where the terrorists had nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons. As long as the threat existed, no place was too far away to worry about. The terrorists weren’t coming to America on wooden sailing ships.

Although it came in several variations, one of Trump’s favorite comparisons was to point to the tip of one of his Sharpies and say, “This is Taiwan,” then point to the Resolute desk and say, “This is China.” So much for American commitments and obligations to another democratic ally.

Instead, especially under Obama, sanctions began to be applied as if they were individual judicial decisions against specific entities and individuals. This approach did exist under certain sanctions authorities in US law, intended for more limited purposes than dealing with massive threats like Iraq in 1990–91, but it was a mistake to expand the practice. Instead, legislation should have been amended where necessary to allow for sweeping sanctions without quasi-prosecutorial investigations and quasi-judicial determinations at the Treasury Department.

prosecutors had their hooks sunk deep

Trump could initiate policies, but his lack of consistency, steadfastness, and resolve invariably undercut them.

The next Administration should fix Mnuchin’s approach immediately so everyone will be on notice that sanctions are an economic weapon we will use effectively, not something we feel guilty about deploying

checking his eyelids for pinholes.

Trump wanted to do what he wanted to do, based on what he knew and what he saw as his own best personal interests.

followed Adam Smith on economics, Edmund Burke on society, The Federalist Papers on government, and a merger of Dean Acheson and John Foster Dulles on national security.

country

—profited from strong-arming others near the end of international meetings with that most-dreaded diplomatic threat: agree with us or there will be no final communiqué!

Trump told Pompeo to call Lavrov and say “some bureaucrat” had published the sanctions—a call that may or may not have ever taken place.

Trump’s inconsistent views and decisions on Russia made all our work complicated, and cyber and noncyber issues often bled into each other.

Isn’t Finland kind of a satellite of Russia?” he asked. (Later that same morning, Trump asked Kelly if Finland was part of Russia.) I tried to explain the history but didn’t get very far before Trump said he too wanted Vienna. “Whatever they [the Russians] want. Tell them we’ll do whatever they want.” After considerable further jockeying, however, we agreed on Helsinki.

When the situation was manageable, it was neglected, and now that it is thoroughly out of hand, we apply too late the remedies which then might have effected a cure.

They promised real influence, access to Trump, and the inevitability of Administration turnover, meaning I would eventually become Secretary of State or something. Based on my government experience, I explained that to run the bureaucracy, you needed to control the bureaucracy, not just watch it from the White House.

Trump really wanted Putin to visit Washington, which the Russians had no intention of doing, and we had been skirmishing over Helsinki and Vienna as possible meeting venues. Russia pushed Vienna, and we pushed Helsinki, but it turned out Trump didn’t favor Helsinki. “Isn’t Finland kind of a satellite of Russia?” he asked. (Later that same morning, Trump asked Kelly if Finland was part of Russia.)

The most inane comment came from the Czech Prime Minister, who said he was making every effort to get to 2 percent by 2024, but their GDP was rising so fast, he was unsure defense spending could keep up. In effect, this was saying they were getting rich too fast to defend themselves adequately.

Finnish saying, “The Cossacks take everything that’s loose.

The key point was there were no agreements on anything, no concessions, no real change in substantive foreign policy. I was delighted. And relieved. No successes, but that didn’t trouble me at all, since I had long seen this entire summit as one massive exercise in damage control.

ceteris paribus,

without action-forcing deadlines, bureaucracies could resist change with incredible tenacity and success.

lighting candles in church (which someone will try to forbid soon because of the carbon footprint of all those burning candles).

the rest of human experience: initially a state of anarchy from which strength and resolve, backed by substantial offensive weaponry, could create structures of deterrence against potential

Erdogan was himself a radical Islamicist. He was busy transforming Turkey from Kemal Ataturk’s secular state into an Islamicist state.

On August 29, I flew from Kiev to Moldova and Belarus, continuing my travels in the former republics of the USSR. I wanted to show Russia we had a sustained focus on its periphery and were not content simply to leave these struggling states to contend with Moscow alone. Had I stayed in the White House longer, I had more substantive plans for US relations with the former Soviet states, but that was not to be. Particularly in Minsk, despite Alexander Lukashenko’s less-than-stellar human-rights record, I wanted to prove the US would not simply watch Belarus be reabsorbed by Russia, which Putin seemed to be seriously considering. One aspect of my strategy was a meeting the Poles arranged in Warsaw on Saturday, August 31, among the national security advisors of Poland, Belarus, Ukraine, and the United States. Let the Kremlin think about that one for a while. I obviously had much more in mind than just having additional meetings, but this was one that would signal other former Soviet republics that neither we nor they had to be passive when faced with Russian belligerence or threats to their internal governance. There was plenty we could all do diplomatically as well as militarily. After I resigned, the Administration and others seemed to be moving in a similar direction.18

prism

came to understand that he believed he could run the Executive Branch and establish national-security policies on instinct, relying on personal relationships with foreign leaders, and with made-for-television showmanship always top of mind.

if Trump’s post-inaugural decision-making process (using that word loosely) was as unconventional and erratic as his personnel selections, I was fine staying outside. If only one could say that for the country.

When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway, the post of honor is a private station.

As the Duke of Wellington once said (perhaps apocryphally), my attitude was, “Print and be damned.

A small group of zealots undermined our golden opportunity to pursue peace, not war. Little did we dream that they had a vastly different “vision” of the New World Order. That group included U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith who held the number three position at the Pentagon, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, a Wolfowitz protégé, who later served as Cheney’s Chief of Staff before his dismissal, John R. Bolton who was assigned to the State Department to keep Secretary of State Colin Powell in check, and Elliott Abrams, appointed to head the Middle East policy at the National Security Council. Apparently all envisioned a world dominated by the U.S. – economically and militarily.

More thunder out of China, in the form of the coronavirus pandemic, came in early 2020. Although epidemiologists (not to mention biological weapons experts) will be studying this catastrophe long into the future; the mark of China’s authoritarian government and social-control systems is all over it. There is little doubt that China delayed, withheld, fabricated, and distorted information about the origin, timing, spread, and extent of the disease;28 suppressed dissent from physicians and others;29 hindered outside efforts by the World Health Organization and others to get accurate information; and engaged in active disinformation campaigns, actually trying to argue that the virus (SARS-CoV-2) and the disease itself (COVID-19) did not originate in China.30 Ironically, some of the worst effects of China’s cover-up were visited on its closest allies. Iran, for example, looked to be one of the worst-hit countries, with satellite photos showing the excavation of burial pits for the expected victims of COVID-19.31

More thunder out of China, in the form of the coronavirus pandemic, came in early 2020. Although epidemiologists (not to mention biological weapons experts) will be studying this catastrophe long into the future; the mark of China’s authoritarian government and social-control systems is all over it. There is little doubt that China delayed, withheld, fabricated, and distorted information about the origin, timing, spread, and extent of the disease;28 suppressed dissent from physicians and others;29 hindered outside efforts by the World Health Organization and others to get accurate information; and engaged in active disinformation campaigns, actually trying to argue that the virus (SARS-CoV-2) and the disease itself (COVID-19) did not originate in China.30 Ironically, some of the worst effects of China’s cover-up were visited on its closest allies. Iran, for example, looked to be one of the worst-hit countries, with satellite photos showing the excavation of burial pits for the expected victims of COVID-19.31 With 2020 being a presidential election year, it was inevitable that Trump’s performance in this global health emergency would become a campaign issue, which it did almost immediately. And there was plenty to criticize, starting with the Administration’s early, relentless assertion that the disease was “contained” and would have little or no economic effect. Larry Kudlow, Chairman of the National Economic Council, said, on February 25, “We have contained this. I won’t say [it’s] airtight, but it’s pretty close to airtight.”32 Market reactions to these kinds of assertions were decidedly negative, which may finally have woken the White House up to the seriousness of the problem.

Trump’s reflex effort to talk his way out of anything, however, even a public-health crisis, only undercut his and the nation’s credibility, with his statements looking more like political damage control than responsible public-health advice. One particularly egregious example was a news report that the Administration tried to classify certain public-health information regarding the United States on the spurious excuse that China was involved.33 Of course China was involved, which is a reason to disseminate the information broadly, not restrict it. This, Trump was reluctant to do throughout the crisis, for fear of adversely affecting the elusive definitive trade deal with China, or offending the ever-so-sensitive Xi Jinping.

North Korea’s approach was different. Kim sent Trump one of his famous “love letters” at the beginning of August, criticizing the lack of progress since Singapore and suggesting the two of them get together again soon.29 Pompeo and I agreed such a meeting needed to be avoided at any cost, and certainly not before the November election. Under such political pressure, who knew what Trump might give away?

As former UN ambassador John Bolton documents in persuasive detail in his book Surrender Is Not An Option, diplomats and State Department negotiators are often more motivated to secure an agreement—even those they know will become mere window dressing that will be ignored by the party across the table—than they are to push for actual, verifiable results favorable to America. When diplomatic success is measured by the agreements and documents we have produced rather than by behavior that has actually changed, we create a false sense of security that prevents us from recognizing and dealing with real threats. The multitude of North Korean agreements, celebrated

Bannon said he’d tried to push John Bolton, the famously hawkish diplomat, for the job as national security advisor. Bolton was an Ailes favorite, too. “He’s a bomb thrower,” said Ailes. “And a strange little fucker. But you need him.

panda huggers like Mnuchin;

When had we started to worry about jobs in China?

He stressed the importance of farmers, and increased Chinese purchases of soybeans and wheat in the electoral outcome. I would print Trump’s exact words, but the government’s prepublication review process has decided otherwise.

Across the Islamic world, the radical philosophies that had caused so much death and destruction were ideological, political as well as religious.

I should have followed my instincts, not my generals,

It was like making and executing policy inside a pinball machine, not the West Wing of the White House.

argue out all these complex, controversial issues. Over and over again, the same issues. Without resolution, or even worse, one outcome one day and a contrary outcome a few days later.

One particularly egregious example was a news report that the Administration tried to classify certain public-health information regarding the United States on the spurious excuse that China was involved.33 Of course China was involved, which is a reason to disseminate the information broadly, not restrict it.

At most, the internal NSC structure was no more than the quiver of a butterfly’s wings in the tsunami of Trump’s chaos.

It was the chair behind the Resolute desk that was empty.

We spent endless hours negotiating with ourselves, whittling away at our own position before our adversaries even got to it, a fine art the State Department had perfected.

But as with every success in government, this was a momentary triumph, and one I knew would not last long. The bureaucracy’s inexorable drive to keep “the process” going would inevitably ignite again, as would Trump’s deathless belief that everyone wanted to talk to him, that everyone was “dying for a deal.

correcting the correction (our new synonym for “reversing”)

So much for consistency. North Korea could conclude, “We fire missiles and get free food.” This was a terrible signal, showing again how eager Trump was for a deal.

We made a weathervane look like the Rock of Gibraltar.

Trump’s schedule was the easiest anomaly to deal with. One of the hardest was his vindictiveness,

Trump closed by saying Lighthizer would be in charge of the deal-making, and Kushner would also be involved, at which point all the Chinese perked up and smiled. You bet.

I briefed Trump on what we knew, and he said he might tweet about it. I urged him, if he did so, to rely only on public sources, but as was so often the case, he ignored this warning, tweeting instead: Our Intelligence has informed us that the Chinese Government is moving troops to the Border with Hong Kong. Everyone should be calm and safe! Many are blaming me, and the United States, for the problems going on in Hong Kong. I can’t imagine why? So much for stopping all those leaks from the “deep state.

After I left the White House, when Trump abandoned the Kurds in Syria, there was speculation about who he might abandon next.27 Taiwan was right near the top of the list, and would probably stay there as long as Trump remained President, not a happy prospect.

neuralgic.

good at not doing what he didn’t want to do” and that he had “a high opinion of his own opinion.

I suspected Trump knew that too, but I was amazed our policy was so close to shifting just thirty-plus hours after being launched. You couldn’t make this up.

but typical of how Trump carelessly defamed those around him,