Atlas Shrugs

Great American Ambassador John Bolton on Foreign Policy Issues

I thought you might be interested in seeing this interview with a great American statesman, Ambassador John Bolton, conducted with the Washington Times on foreign policy issues here:

January 25, 2013: John Bolton, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, served in several Republican administrations as an Assistant Attorney General, an Undersecretary of State, and as the United States Ambassador to the United Nations. He discusses here his views on American foreign policy and whether it is driven by idealism or self-interest, the role of foreign aid, the importance of Israel, and the importance of economic globalization.

****

Joseph F. Cotto: The United States spends a great deal of money on foreign aid programs. In your opinion, are most of these programs cost effective?

Ambassador John Bolton: Foreign aid can certainly contribute to advancing American national interests around the world, but only if it designed and implemented with those interests in mind. Too often, however, we allocate assistance as if we had some abstract obligation to engage in “nation building” or international welfare. Especially in times of great budgetary stringency, we should redirect our assistance away from multilateral programs, such as the World Bank, the regional development banks and the United Nations, toward bilateral programs, both military and economic. We should focus particularly on countries that support our efforts against the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and international terrorism.

Cotto: It has been said that a nation should act in its own self-interest when dealing with international crises. Do you believe that American foreign policy today is sufficiently self-interested?

Ambassador Bolton: I think President Obama’s foreign policy rests less on defending American interests and more on his ideological distaste for the projection of American power and values. He is comfortable with a declining U.S. role, whether acting unilaterally or through our structure of alliances like NATO, as reflected by his massive defense budget cuts in his four years, nearing a trillion dollars and his apparent indifference to further cuts of $500 billion through the looming sequestration mechanism.

The Obama Administration has failed utterly to stem rogue nuclear proliferators like Iran and North Korea, and we have seen al Qaeda and terrorism generally metastasize across North Africa and the Middle East, as the September 11 tragedy in Benghazi and the deaths of 23 Western hostages in the Algeria terrorist attack demonstrate. Obama has made a complete mess of his own “reset” policy with Russia, and he has no China strategy whatever. This is a prescription for real trouble for America going forward.

Cotto: If one thing could be done to restructure our country's foreign policy, what would you suggest that it be?

Ambassador Bolton: Get a new President. The 2016 election cannot come soon enough. Ronald Reagan’s foreign policy was based on the theory of “peace through strength,” whereas Obama’s seems to be almost precisely the opposite. 

The past four years were bad enough, but every prospect is that the next four will be worse. Our adversaries worldwide have sized up Barack Obama, and they see he is weak and inattentive, concentrating on national security issues only when he has no alternative but to put his obsession with domestic efforts to “fundamentally transform” America (his phrase form the 2008 campaign). Accordingly, terrorists, proliferators and others who seek to weaken or harm America have recalibrated their policies to take advantage of our disarray, and I would expect those challenges to expand and accelerate in a second term.

Bangladesh: Muslims torch Buddhist temples, homes

As the West continues to abridge its freedoms, sanction the most violent and extreme ideology on the face of the earth, and destroy those who dare speak against the sharia, the global jihad rages on ........ burning, slaughtering and making life hell on earth for non-Muslims in Muslim countries.

"Bangladesh: Muslims torch Buddhist temples, homes" CBS News 

COX'S BAZAR, Bangladesh — Thousands of Bangladeshi Muslims angry over an alleged derogatory photo of the Islamic holy book Quran on Facebook set fires in at least 10 Buddhist temples and 40 homes near the southern border with Myanmar, authorities said Sunday.

The violence began late Saturday and continued until early Sunday, said Nojibul Islam, a police chief in the coastal district of Cox's Bazar.

He said the situation was under control Sunday afternoon after extra security officials were deployed and the government banned public gatherings in the troubled area.

He said at least 20 people were injured in the attacks that followed the posting of a Facebook photo of a burned copy of the Quran. The rioters blamed the photo on a local Buddhist boy, though it was not immediately clear if the boy actually posted the photo.

Bangladesh's popular English-language Daily Star newspaper quoted the boy as saying that the photo was mistakenly tagged on his Facebook profile. The newspaper reported that soon after the violence broke out, the boy's Facebook account was closed and police escorted him and his mother to safety.

Joinul Bari, chief government administrator in Cox's Bazar district, said authorities detained the boy's parents and were investigating.

Buddhists make up less than 1 percent of Muslim-majority Bangladesh's 150 million people.

The Bangladeshi violence follows protests that erupted in Muslim countries over the past month after a low-budget film, "Innocence of Muslims," produced by a U.S. citizen denigrated the Prophet Muhammad by portraying Islam's holiest figure as a fraud, womanizer and child molester.

Some two dozen demonstrators were killed in protests that attacked symbols of U.S. and the West, including diplomatic compounds.

VIDEO John Bolton: Obama Taking Credit For Killing Bin Laden Is Like Richard Nixon Taking Credit For Landing on the Moon in 1969

"The irony is, he's campaigning on the basis that he's a success as a foreign policy president. This is really amazing. ...It's because Navy Seal Team 6 killed Osama bin Laden, that is his definition of success. In 1969, when Americans landed on the moon, it is like Richard Nixon taking credit for that. Because it happened to occur during his presidency"
 
John Bolton: Obama Taking Credit For Killing Bin Laden Is Like Richard Nixon Taking Credit For Landing on the Moon in 1969 (Video) ...

Bingo.

More on Obama's scorched earth foreign policy:

BOLTON: "The irony is, he's campaigning on the basis that he's a success as a foreign policy president. This is really amazing."

Bolton: If You’re Thinking Of Voting For Ron Paul, ‘Think Again’

"That’s why I think the debate on the Republican side is so important. And why when I see, I have to be candid, a candidate like Ron Paul whose foreign policy is if anything is worse than the Obama administration apparently leading in Iowa according to some polls, it just gives me great concern...So if you’re thinking about Ron Paul because of his domestic issues, think again and look at virtually any of the other candidates and consider how they would be as Commander-in-Chief. That’s the president’s first duty, defending the country."

Via Breitbart.tv.

Previously at Atlas:

Ron Paul: U.S. Shouldn't Have Fought Hitler Just to Save Jews From Holocaust

Ron Paul Walks Out On CNN Interview When Asked About His Newsletter Blaming Israel for 1993 WTC Attack

Ron Paul's Racist Newsletters

Bolton: Biden's Statement that Taliban Not Our Enemy Was No Gaffe

First Obama and Biden wanted to work with what they called the "moderate Taliban." Even the Taliban thought that was ridiculous. And it was -- sort of like a chaste prostitute. The Taliban does not share Western values, goals, objectives. The Taliban's playbook is the qur'an and its stated aims.

The whole idea of a moderate Taliban or a moderate Islam is false, and Obama knows it. So now, according to Biden, the Taliban is not our enemy at all.

Never mind their role in 9/11. Never mind their hosting al-Qaeda camps and working with al-Qaeda.

It amounts to surrender, to prostration before the jihadist enemy.

Now, we know old Joe is none too bright, but here Bolton explains: this was no gaffe.

Bolton Says Biden's Taliban Statement Wasn't Gaffe Newsmax December 21

Former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton said Tuesday that Joe Biden’s statement that the Taliban is not America's enemy in Afghanistan was not a gaffe, but instead the vice president was “articulating what the White House strategy is.” Biden made his remarks in a recent Newsweek interview, but the Obama administration is saying they were taken out of context.

“I don’t think this is a gaffe by Joe Biden — I think he is articulating what the White House strategy is — I think they know exactly what they are trying to do,” Bolton told Fox News’ Greta Van Susteren. “They are trying to redefine the terrorist threat to be a limited group of al-Qaida people along the Afghan-Pakistan border.

“They are going to redefine Taliban away from that — they are going to ignore Taliban in the Arabian Peninsula, and al-Qaida in Iraq, and al-Qaida in North Africa,” Bolton said. “And they’re going to say it’s just that one little thing: We’ve killed Osama bin Laden — the war on terror is over.”

Van Susteren noted that when she recently was in Afghanistan with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton they saw firsthand how the Taliban treats women and wondered whether the United States can really not view the Taliban as an enemy. Bolton said the Taliban treats anyone who does not agree with them horribly.

“I think this strategy is something the Democrats have looked [to] before. It reminds me of Vietnam. Remember Sen. George Aiken, the Republican of Vermont? It was clear to him that we didn’t have the stamina to go on and actually win,” Bolton said. “So the George Aiken strategy: We’ll declare victory and get out — that is what the administration is going to do in the war on terror. Having redefined who the terrorists are and having said the Taliban is not our enemy, they’re going to say we have won and the war is over."

That would be great, except for the inconvenient truth that it isn't over. The jihad against the U.S. will continue all over the world, not just in Afghanistan. And neither Biden nor his boss are doing anything to resist it.

John Bolton on Nork's "Great Successor"

Here is the most informed American statesman on what's next for North Korea:

'The Great Successor' John Bolton

There's no guarantee that the North Korean military will accept another hereditary ruler.

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il's death opens a period of intense danger and risk, but also potentially enormous opportunity for America and its allies. Kim's health had obviously been poor for some time, and his regime has worked to ensure an orderly transition to his son, Kim Jong Eun. The Kim family and its supporters, with everything obviously at stake, will work strenuously to convey stability and control. Indeed, the official North Korea news agency has already referred to Jong Eun as "the great successor to the revolutionary cause."

But the loathsome Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK) is not a constitutional monarchy like Britain. While DPRK founder Kim Il Sung was powerful enough to impose his son, no guarantees exist that the North's military, the real power, will meekly accept rule by his utterly inexperienced grandson.

Under the surface in Pyongyang, the maneuvering has almost certainly already begun. There is no reason whatever to believe that opinion among the military leadership will be unanimous, either to support or oppose the regime's succession plan. In fact, the early reports are that Kim Jong Il's death went undisclosed publicly for days, perhaps indicating a power struggle already under way. Many generals may simply not accept that Leader 3.0 is competent or merits their support.

While an authoritarian DPRK state, armed with nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, is a threat regionally and globally, a fractured DPRK, leaderless and perhaps descending into civil war, is an even greater threat. The prospect of conflict among various military and other security forces, which like the Kim family also have everything on the line, is real. Control over the weapons of mass destruction and other key assets (missile launch sites and storage facilities, communications facilities, the loyalty of major military formations such as the artillery, and armor massed near the borders) will be essential. 

Moreover, North Korea's civilians are not, despite decades of effort by Pyongyang, totally ignorant about conditions outside the hermetic state. Already desperately impoverished and hungry, they may well decide at the first signs of regime collapse, or even before, that their moment is at hand. Aided by South Korean activists, they could begin moving north toward the Yalu River border with China or south to the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), which has divided North from South since the 1953 Korean War Armistice Agreement.

South Korean authorities, together with the nearly 30,000 U.S. forces there, have long prepared for the contingency of massive refugee flows toward the DMZ. They also have plans for entering North Korea in force on extremely short notice, to prevent massive instability, to secure the nuclear weapons, and to control the DMZ. 

The last thing we need is for the North's destructive weapons (or other elements of its nuclear program) to be used during internal conflict, or auctioned off to foreign states or terrorists by military factions desperate for hard currency to continue their struggle or flee the country. But while we believe that large stocks of chemical and biological weapons are located near the DMZ, we have very little knowledge of where the nuclear weapons actually are. If South Korean and U.S. forces have to enter the North, time will be short, the dangers high, and the odds long.

By itself, the risk of massive cross-border refugee movements should have prompted intense U.S.-Chinese consultations about the inevitable succession crisis. Unfortunately, little appears to have been done, despite continuing, visible evidence of Kim Jong Il's physical decline. Quite the contrary. Once again, in defiance of all logic and history, the Obama administration has been negotiating with North Korean diplomats, hoping to trade food aid for more empty promises to denuclearize.

One immediate concern is that China's Peoples Liberation Army will decide to intervene, hoping to avoid massive refugee flows across the Yalu River into China and to stabilize whatever government exists in Pyongyang. Clearly, Washington and Beijing should be working together behind the scenes to prevent any military mishaps that might be sparked by instability in Pyongyang.

But there is a larger potential here. Washington should have been preparing for the opportunity Kim's death presents, namely the long-desired prospect that we could peacefully reunite the two Koreas, our stated objective since their "temporary" 1945 partition. Beijing should see reunification as being in its best interests, eliminating the nuclear risk that has troubled Northeast Asia. 

But old Communist ties die hard, not to mention Beijing's fear of U.S. forces being positioned just south of the Yalu River. They saw that movie in 1950, and they don't like it any better today than they did then. Nonetheless, if there were ever a moment to contemplate reunification managed in the best interest of both China and America, not to mention the peoples of both Koreas, this is it.

Risk and opportunity often come together, and Kim's death provides both in ample measure. This is a true crisis, a real 3 a.m. call. Let us pray that President Obama is up to it.

“If he will accept it, I will appoint John Bolton as Secretary of State”

I love Gingrich for saying it, but I would expect that whoever the next president of the United States is, John Bolton would be appointed Secretary of State. Nobody even comes close.

At the Republican Jewish Coalition conference a few minutes ago Newt Gingrich announced

“If he will accept it, I will appoint John Bolton as Secretary of State.”

This alone is reason enough to vote for him. Thanks to Legal Insurrection (hat tip Atlas readers)

Bolton on Awlaki: "the struggle against jihadism is not over"

Any candidate who doesn't confer with Ambassador Bolton and name him to his/her cabinet will not and should not get the GOP nod.

Anwar al-Awlaki and the US's long war on al-Qaida By John Bolton The Guardian October 3, 2011

What George Bush started, Barack Obama has completed: he should take credit. But the struggle against jihadism is not over

The well-deserved death of Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen continues a string of recent battlefield losses for al-Qaida, the most notable being Osama bin Laden at the hands of Seal Team Six. Decapitating the enemy's leadership is an ancient tactic of warfare, and US intelligence and strike technology has brought it to new heights.

But despite our well-deserved jubilation when another terrorist rightfully meets his maker, the global war against Awlaki's ilk is far from over. Understanding what his death does and doesn't mean has consequences extending far beyond one enemy combatant's demise.

First, and perhaps foremost, is that it was Barack Obama's administration that ultimately implemented Awlaki's execution. Despite the president's refusal (so far) to acknowledge explicitly that he gave the order to kill Awlaki, there is no doubt, whether through a signed intelligence "finding", classified executive order, or extensive briefings about the US target list, the ultimate command responsibility was Obama's. He should be proud of his decision. He deserves credit for making the right call, as he does for ordering Seal Team Six to kill bin Laden.

Moreover, the Obama administration's pattern of targeted killings in the war on terror establishes an important conceptual point. It is now clear beyond dispute that the United States, on a bipartisan basis, fully embraces the paradigm that the threat of international terrorism is a matter of war, not a matter of law enforcement. And rightly so. Law enforcement is what constitutional governments do inside their own civil societies. War is fought between societies, nations and ideologies, and international terrorists are clearly waging war against us.

While terrorism does not fit entirely comfortably within the war paradigm, which the west developed using nation states as the key actors, what Awlaki did for a living was a far cry from robbing the neighborhood bank. He was treated accordingly, and press reports indicate all Obama's legal advisers concurred that targeting Awlaki was entirely legitimate.

This is nothing new. The post 9/11 authorisation to use military force passed the House and Senate overwhelmingly among both parties. Since then, though, advocates of treating terrorism like bank robbery have tried to nibble away at the legality and morality of – and the political support for – the war on terror. That Barack Obama presided over the killing of an American citizen like Awlaki (albeit one who had renounced his citizenship) marks a major advance in solidifying and legitimising the war paradigm.

This does not mean the United States acts lawlessly. Quite the contrary. But in war, including against international terrorism, we operate under a legal framework very different from criminal law, and for good and sufficient reasons. What George W Bush started doctrinally, Barack Obama has now completed.

Second, while Awlaki's death eliminates an important al-Qaida propagandist and recruiter (and also, lately, an operative), it is no cause to relax our global efforts. His terrorist sandals may momentarily seem hard to fill, but as history sadly demonstrates, not impossibly so. Vladimir Lenin's death did not bring the end of Bolshevism; it brought Joseph Stalin.

Moreover, while tempting to declare victory and go home, as the Obama administration is erroneously doing in Iraq and Afghanistan, withdrawal simply ensures that all our victories will fade away, and provide ample opportunities for the terrorists to regroup and re-emerge stronger than ever. Jihadi terrorism is, unfortunately, far more threatening than one man, however evil.

Read the rest at, of all places, The Guardian.

Bolton: Defund UN over Pali Terror State Bid

Love. that. man. The country suffered a loss when Bolton decided not to run in 2012. Was there there ever a time in post-WWII history for moral clarity, reason and courage?

Bolton: US should threaten to defund UN over Palestinian statehood Right Scoop

Gosh I love John Bolton. He really knows how to put the UN in its place:

Well if I were Israel and/or the United States, I wouldn’t pay any attention to a General Assembly resolution. Look, the General Assembly could vote this week to make Disney Land a state and it wouldn’t have any more impact outside of the General Assembly hall for Palestine or Disney Land.

When Greta asserted that the Obama administration is doing everything it can to fight Palestinian statehood, Bolton quickly challenged that premise by suggesting that they could threaten to defund the UN over a yes vote, just as they did in 1989 when the PLO was asserting the same thing. Now that’s what I’m talking about, but it’s just wishful thinking since Obama worships at the shrine of the UN.

Here's more on the savages' bid for statehood.

Palestinian U.N. Statehood Bid -- More Broadway Theater Than a Serious Effort to Achieve Middle East Peace By Amb. John Bolton, FOX News September 20, 2011 |

The Palestinian Authority (“P.A.”) is proceeding full steam ahead to create “facts on the ground” in the Middle East by working the Manhattan corridors of the United Nations. This is neither the first time, nor undoubtedly the last, that Palestinian leaders have succumbed to the delusion that Middle Eastern reality can be changed by irrelevant U.N. activity.

The tactical ploys and counter-ploys are now flying around the U.N. compound. In the midst of all of the conflicting news reports we will see and hear, keep in mind one thing: this is more Broadway theater than a serious effort to achieve Middle East peace.

The odds of “Palestine” becoming a U.N. member are essentially zero. Although President Obama may once have toyed with not vetoing a PA move for membership (thus, ironically, encouraging the chaos now unfolding at Turtle Bay), he has rejected this counterproductive idea. Washington will veto, period.

Possibly, the P.A. bid may not even obtain the majority of nine (out of fifteen) Security Council votes it needs under the U.N. Charter, thus meaning that, technically, Washington’s “no” vote would not actually be a “veto.”

Accordingly, I think it unlikely that the P.A. will go to the Council. Although in the U.N. Twilight Zone, defeat is often spun as a moral victory, any more such “victories” for the P.A. could mean its complete collapse.

Most likely, therefore, the P.A. will seek a U.N. General Assembly vote, perhaps recognizing the P.A.’s “statehood,” or perhaps changing its U.N. status from “observer organization” to “observer state.” Given the General Assembly’s political layout, any such resolution, no matter how worded, will pass overwhelmingly.

But what exactly will that mean? Many in Israel and America are panicked at the prospect of “Palestine” being declared a “state,” even if merely an “observer.” Israel officials will be hauled before the International Criminal Court (“ICC”) for prosecution, they say, “Palestine” will suddenly assume control over its air space and waters adjacent to Gaza, they say, impairing Israel’s self-defense. And on and on and on, they say.

This is all nonsense. The only practical result of the General Assemble declaring “Palestine” a state will be to move its chair on the side of the Assembly hall a few feet from its present location to be next to the Vatican, the only other “observer state.” This is nothing to get excited about.

But what of the hysterical concerns so many express, typically to insist that Israel should offer concessions to the P.A. to forestall any U.N. vote? In fact, General Assembly resolutions are not binding on anyone other than itself. It could declare Disneyland an observer state, and treat it accordingly, but no one else need do so.

If the ICC were to interpret a General Assembly resolution as permitting “Palestine” to become a party to the ICC’s founding treaty, the Rome Statute, it would be making a political decision not a legal decision, and one clearly beyond its authority.

Such an irresponsible ICC action would transform the currently dim chances of America ever joining into an absolute certainty. U.S. opposition to the ICC is already strong, and targeting Israel would lock in our opposition as far into the future as predictive powers allow. Any other U.N. agency making the same decision would risk grave damage, including possibly losing U.S. funding. Bring it on.

The PA’s ill-advised U.N. stratagem will not improve the chances for Middle East peace, it will not truly enhance the PA’s status, and it will not improve living conditions for average Palestinians. This entire episode is fantasy, and should be so regarded, whatever happens on First Avenue.

Primarily Bolton

I can think of no one more qualified for the office of the President. The depth and breadth of his knowledge and experience is the antidote to the sick, debilitated state of the country which Obama has inflicted upon us. We need extraordinary in the extraordinary times.  We need gravitas.

The Primary Event: Tracking the 2012 election.

Bolton: GOP Nominee Must Challenge Obama on Foreign Policy, National Defense July 30, 2011, NRO Michael Sandoval

Denver – If Amb. John Bolton decides to mount a campaign for the GOP presidential nomination in 2012, foreign policy and national defense will clearly be a cornerstone in his bid.
However, when asked point blank by Centennial Institute founder and event organizer John Andrews about a possible run, Bolton refrained from any conclusive statement, tipping his hand only as to how he thought the eventual Republican nominee should be prepared to challenge Pres. Barack Obama.
“I’ve never run for public office in my life. So this is an enormous decision. But I feel very passionately that the protection of the United States in the world is the president’s highest obligation, and we have a president now who is not doing that,” said Bolton.
Referring to the inevitable debates in the fall of 2012, Bolton noted that the Republican nominee needs to be prepared to take Obama to task on foreign and defense policy. “By that time, President Obama will have pretended to be commander-in-chief for almost four years. He is a good actor,” said Bolton. But the nominee must prove his or her strong credentials in this area and pounce on a clear opportunity, Bolton argued.
“If the Republican nominee is not prepared to go head-to-head with him, and show that that nominee is capable of leading us in a challenging world, Obama will emerge from that debate with a bigger advantage,” Bolton declared.
Bolton’s speech featured a wide-ranging discussion on nuclear proliferation in Iran, America’s alliance with Israel, and how Obama’s foreign-policy views have diverged drastically from presidential tradition.
“If you think we’re in a crisis now about coming up on a debt ceiling, imagine a crisis where we face terrorists or rogue states with nuclear weapons. That is the definition of crisis,” Bolton argued. It is critically important, according to Bolton, to restore America’s national security “to the very top” of the list of our nation’s priorities.
Bolton remained focused on what he believed was the key source of America’s perceived weakness abroad — the current administration.
“We have a crisis of leadership in the White House. We have a president who is not qualified to lead us in national security,” Bolton said to strong applause from the audience.
In Bolton’s estimation, while Obama’s attention has primarily fallen on transforming the American economy, his diminished views on American exceptionalism have lead him to ignore national security interests at America’s peril.
“We have a president who thinks that American decline is natural, is inevitable,” said Bolton. “National security, for President Obama, comes primarily from his devout belief in multilateralism as the protection for America.”
“What’s provocative to our adversaries around the world is American weakness,” Bolton concluded.
The closest Bolton came to deviating from a typical policy briefing was in a line sure to be incorporated into the stump speech from the eventual GOP nominee, even if that person is not Bolton himself.
“It’s time we got a real president in the White House. And it’s time we got a president less concerned about being a citizen of the world, and more concerned about defending America,” said Bolton, as cheers erupted from the crowd.

Band of Military Mothers and Wonder Women Run Interference for John Bolton From Antisemite Code Pink Attack (Video)

CODEPINK attempted to attack an amused John Bolton. This is the level of subversion and revolutionary violence we see increasing on the left.

The communists and Jew haters from Code Pink were back at it this week after returning from their failed nazi mission, aka the Gaza jihad flotilla. And on Tuesday, the hardcore leftists harassed Ambassador John Bolton outside the Congressional Building. That’s when a band of military mothers came to his rescue. My soul sisters, Bev Perlson of Band of Mothers and fierce patriot Katie O'Malley, were out there, flanking J to the B. Katie sent me this on this grotesque lack of respect for an American hero, stateman and patriot:

FYI: Bev Perlson, founder of Band of Mothers, and Debbie Lee, a Gold Star mother, surrounded Ambassador Bolton with military support signs and protected him from the Code Pink attack. Then they got Code Pink kicked off the corner, which is why the video shows the Pinkos walking away. They didn’t have a permit. Blue Star and Gold Star moms protected Bolton from the vile leftists.

O'Malley opines,

"Hi Pamela,
"thanks...what you don't really see if the police pushing them across the street...and John Bolton laughing at them.....he was Ambassador to the UN with no power to declare or vote for war...how is he a war criminal....asshats"

Not to worry, Ambassador Bolton, the babes have your back, bigtime.

And warrior Mom, Bev Perlson wrote,"The Band of Mothers had secured a permit to stand for our troops on the Cannon Bldg corner in DC this past week and I am proud to say we stood for Ambassador John Bolton too!"

Video Hat Tip Founding Bloggers Katie O. sent this on the failed attack via Jim Hoft.

Photo right: Medea 'Zyclon B' Benjamin and the American statesman, John Bolton, checking his blackberry.

Ambassador Bolton on Boehner Plan and the debt ceiling

Lest we not make perfect the enemy of the good.

All conservatives, especially those concerned with American national security, should support the Boehner Plan.
 
That plan, as Speaker Boehner himself understands, is far from perfect.  But there is no reasonable prospect, given the current political balance of power in Washington, to get anything better on the debt ceiling issue.  We cannot know exactly how financial markets will react to the various scenarios that might play out over the next several days, but the potential cost of finding out what the defeat of the Boehner Plan would be is not worth the risk.
 
If America's prospects for economic recovery are gravely impaired, if President Obama is able to turn the inevitable turmoil to his political advantage and achieve re-election, and if we face four more years of his debilitating economic and national security policies, the safety and security of America in the world may be damaged irreparably.
 
In politics as in battle, conservatives should remember Carl von Clausewitz's sage advice to be satisfied with identifying and achieving "the culminating point of victory."  That does not mean total victory, but rather the maximum that can be achieved in any particular engagement.  We should not stop short, but neither should we risk what we have achieved by proceeding dangerously beyond that culminating point.
 
There are many more battles to be fought to rescue our economy and preserve our national defenses.  But on this present issue, we have reached the culminating point of victory.  Let's not throw it away.
 
John R. Bolton
July 27, 2011

Bolton Challenge: "Decide America"

John Bolton has launched a new defense initiative, Decide America. Check it out. This is wonderful news. We need brilliant and proud statesmen like Ambassador John Bolton engaging in the dialogue directly with the American people. I strongly urge you to sign on.

I pray he runs. When America wakes up from this destructive, crippling Obinge, it is not going to be pretty. We will need a leader of substance with the depth and breadth to lead the American people while holding them in the highest regard and with the respect that we, the people, deserve.

I look forward to hearing Ambassador Bolton's remarks at our 911 Freedom Rally at Ground Zero on September 11th, marking the tenth anniversary of the biggest and bloodiest attacks on American soil in our nation's history.

John Bolton launches new national security group Politico July 15

John Bolton’s hasn’t decided whether he’ll get in to the presidential campaign, but he’s getting into the debate.

John Bolton Exposes Obama's Failure in South Caucasus

This is the stuff of a great American presdient, I tell ya. Out with the old guard, in with the pro-Americans. Bolton, Bachmann, Palin, Cain.........

John Bolton advised U.S. President to attribute more attention to South Caucasus News AM

Possible candidate for upcoming U.S. presidential elections John Bolton advised Barack Obama administration to attribute more attention to South Caucasus region. Bolton stressed that Russia persistently tries to restore its influence on the region. He reminded of Russian PM Vladimir Putin’s estimations of the collapse of Soviet Union, attributing it to the current processes in South Caucasus, reports Caucasus Online. 

“We have to remember the statement of then-president Vladimir Putin, that the collapse of the USSR is the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of 20th century,” said Bolton, adding that these words fully reflect Russia’s current policy in South Caucasus.

According to the politician, Obama’s administration must openly support Azerbaijan in the context to Karabakh conflict settlement, since except Armenian and Azerbaijani sides it involves Russia as well.

“We must not forget Russia’s assault of Georgia of August 2008. Russia aims at restoring its influence over the region and the U.S. must give due attention to that fact,” said Bolton.

Related: Russian President Medvedev Says He Wants Obama To Be Re-elected To Avoid America’s “Conservative Wing”

TEXT: John R. Bolton Remarks before Committee on Foreign Affairs, United States House of Representatives Iran and Syria: Next Steps

Here's the thing. With extraordinary men and women like Bolton on today's political scene, why do we have such a dangerous, incompetent fool in the White House?

John R. Bolton,

 Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute before the 

Committee on Foreign Affairs

United States House of Representatives

 Iran and Syria:  Next Steps

Madam Chairman and Members of the Committee, I would like to thank you very much for the invitation to appear before you today to discuss next steps on Iran and Syria. I have a prepared statement, which I will summarize, and ask that it be inserted in the record.  I would, of course, be pleased to answer any questions that you or other Members of the Committee might have.

The Iranian nuclear weapons program, and its potential linkages to Syria, remains one of the most critical national-security challenges facing America, perhaps even the gravest near-term threat.  After nearly twenty years of fruitless U.S. and Western efforts to prevent Iran from achieving its objective of deliverable nuclear weapons, we are now at a critical point.  Iran is very close to reaching its goals, through its own efforts, its collaboration with North Korea and other rogue states like Venezuela that allow it to evade international pressure, and its hegemony over Syria, where the extent of its nuclear activities is largely unknown.  Even as Iran’s efforts rapidly near success, the United States may yet prevent the emergence of a nuclear Iran.  But time is short, and we will surely fail if we continue to pursue our present policies.  Once Iran gets nuclear weapons, the Middle East and the larger world will change forever, and much to the disadvantage of the United States, and its friends and allies worldwide.

IRAN

We should begin with blunt truths about Iran’s nuclear weapons program.  Despite years of diplomatic negotiations, multiple layers of international sanctions, and creative efforts at disruption (including, most recently, the Stuxnet computer virus), Iran’s seemingly inexorable march toward nuclear weapons continues.  The Pasdaran, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps, recently published on its website a story about the world’s reaction the day after Iran’s first nuclear test.[1]  Estimates based on publicly available information differ, but the theme underlying them all is entirely pessimistic, especially concerning Iran’s vigorous uranium enrichment program.  Iran is not only expanding its production capacity for enriched uranium, but is moving to ever-more sophisticated centrifuge designs that will allow its future enrichment production to be much larger than at present.  By almost all standards, uranium enrichment is “the long pole in the tent” when it comes to fashioning nuclear weapons, and there is little or nothing, except imminent regime change in Tehran or external military intervention, that can prevent that outcome.  While more work is obviously required once the concentration of U235 isotopes has been enriched to weapons-grade levels (“HEU,” or “highly enriched uranium”), such as converting it into uranium metal, fabricating that metal into a form usable for a nuclear weapon, and then building the final weapon itself, it is uranium enrichment that is the principal process to be mastered.

John Bolton on How to Stop the "Palestine" Statehood Ploy

Congress can threaten to cut U.S. money for the U.N. We need this kind of thinking in the White House. Anyone but Obama in 2012.

How to Block the Palestine Statehood Ploy Wall Street Journal  June 3, 2011 By John Bolton

Now that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his recent sparring partner Barack Obama are back in their corners, the next Arab-Israeli political flash point could be this fall at the U.N. General Assembly. The Palestinian Authority is lobbying Assembly members to legitimize its claim to international status as a "state." 

Recognizing "statehood" does not mean U.N. membership, but it would nonetheless be a major Palestinian success. A resolution recognizing a Palestinian "state" could also declare its boundary to be the 1967 borders (in actuality, merely the 1949 armistice lines), with or without President Obama's caveat about "agreed upon swaps" of land.


The obvious Palestinian objective is to remove the issues of statehood and boundaries from the realm of bilateral negotiations with Israel, making them fait accompli. Last fall, the Palestinians focused on obtaining a Security Council resolution for this purpose. They believed, for whatever reason, that Mr. Obama would not order an American veto, as his predecessors would have done without hesitation. Many thought the administration might even vote "yes" rather than abstain. 

When it became clear that U.S. opposition in the Security Council was likely, on statehood or on U.N. membership, Palestinian attention shifted to the General Assembly, where there is no veto. General Assembly resolutions are not legally binding, and that body has no authority to recognize states, although its actions can be politically powerful, as the 1975 "Zionism is racism" resolution demonstrated.


This is déjà vu all over again. In late 1988, Palestinians issued a "declaration of statehood," changing their U.N. observer delegation's name from "Palestine Liberation Organization" to "Palestine" to sound more like a state, which scores of countries recognized. The Palestinians then campaigned to join U.N. bodies like the World Health Organization, reasoning that since U.N. agency charters allow only states as members, the admission of "Palestine" would prove that it, too, was a state.


Ridiculous in the real world but not in the U.N., the PLO effort gained overwhelming support there. George H.W. Bush's new administration and Israel protested that "Palestine" manifestly did not meet customary international law definitions of statehood, such as having a clearly defined territory and exercising a government's legitimate domestic and international responsibilities. Third World countries rallied almost unanimously to the PLO, and Europe's response was weak. European diplomats believed Washington's opposition was merely pro forma due to the "Jewish lobby."


Faced with the near certainty of defeat, Secretary of State James Baker warned publicly: "I will recommend to the President that the United States make no further contributions, voluntary or assessed, to any international organization which makes any changes in the PLO's status as an observer organization."


No politician of Mr. Baker's skill would publicize his proposals unless he knew that the president would accept them, and this reality was rapidly understood internationally. Although defeating the PLO campaign required further maneuvering, Mr. Baker's statement was the death knell of the "statehood" push.

The lesson for today is plain. If President Obama wants to block a General Assembly Palestinian statehood resolution, he should act essentially as Messrs. Bush and Baker did. Yet Mr. Obama is highly unlikely to do anything so decisive, which is why many in America and Israel remain gravely concerned about this latest Palestinian diplomatic ploy.


Accordingly, we should turn to Congress, which has a rich history of dealing with U.N. actions it doesn't appreciate. Rather than wait for a Baker-like threat, Congress should legislate broadly that any U.N. action that purports to acknowledge or authorize Palestinian statehood will result in a cutoff of all U.S. contributions to the offending agency. If the General Assembly ignored this warning, all funds would be cut off to the bloated Secretariat in New York, but not to separate agencies like the World Health Organization, the International Atomic Energy Agency, and others with their own governing bodies and funding mechanisms.


The logic is the same today as it was in 1989. Moreover, our current federal budget deficits provide another attractive reason to reduce U.N. contributions. If political realities make it impossible to cut off funding completely, perhaps a partial reduction, say 50%, might be a suitable compromise.


Although the General Assembly will not convene again until September, there is no time to waste. Fatah's coalition with Hamas already provides statutory grounds (since the U.S. lists Hamas as a terrorist organization) to eliminate funding for the Palestinian Authority. Reducing U.S. funding to the U.N. is the next available, highly visible, target of opportunity. It presents the U.N. membership with a fascinating question: Would they rather recognize Palestinian statehood, or keep America's money?

Mr. Bolton, who served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from 2005 to 2006, is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

John Bolton: "Netanyahu .. exposed broader flaws in Obama’s worldview"

How does a great American statesman evaluate Obama's ambush of the Prime Minister of Israel? Here is sound advice and direction from an exceptional American patriot of extraordinary intellect:

3 Things for Obama's Opponents to Do Now That Netanyahu Has Created a New Israeli-Palestinian Dynamic

By Amb. John Bolton

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s unambiguous rejection of Barack Obama’s latest fantasy about the Middle East has potentially created a significant new political dynamic in the United States. By graciously but comprehensively rebutting Obama’s entire view of Arab-Israeli reality, first in the Oval Office, then before a joint meeting of Congress, Netanyahu has also exposed broader flaws in Obama’s worldview.

No Israeli leader could simply cave in immediately to Obama’s ill-disguised pressure in his uncongenial, unsympathetic State Department speech just prior to Netanyahu’s arrival in America. While Obama may have understood this limitation, he nonetheless intended to create political “facts on the ground” for Israel, pushing it into a corner difficult if not impossible to escape. While Obama did not, as some in his administration urged, lay out precise terms and conditions of, effectively, an American ultimatum, he came perilously close.

Little he said was actually new for him, including referring to Israel’s “1967 borders” (subsequently “clarified”). Nor was his tone more hostile than his past comments or those of other Administration officials. Several observers noted correctly that Obama’s speech “could have been worse,” which is unquestionably true. 

Many speculated former Senator George Mitchell, Obama’s Middle East envoy, resigned precisely because his preferred approach to muscling Israel was rejected.

The critical difference this time was Netanyahu’s reaction. He ignored the advice of Obama’s fellow liberals in the Jewish community never to cross a sitting president, especially not this one.

Israel’s American supporters, Jewish and non-Jewish alike, defend its national-security interests because of how interwoven they are with America’s own vital interests, in the Middle East and globally. Non-Jewish American support for Israel is not, therefore, to mix metaphors, a case of appearing to be more Catholic than the pope.

Accordingly, they took heart from the Oval Office exchange, and visibly demonstrated their opposition to Obama’s views by the warm greeting for Netanyahu in Congress. Since these supporters are a decisive majority of the American public, stretching far beyond the confines of one faith, they can reshape the domestic American debate on Israel and the region. This is critical, since, thanks to Obama, U.S.-Israeli relations are more politically strained than ever before, a public division inevitably providing our adversaries with dangerous opportunities for trouble-making.

Nonetheless, since Obama remains president for two more years, what should opponents of his misguided policies do to capitalize on the new dynamic Netanyahu has created?

First, members of Congress must build on Netanyahu's Joint Meeting appearance through hearings, speeches, and House and Senate resolutions that Israel’s U.S. support remains broad and deep on Capitol Hill, even as it recedes almost to invisibility in the White House. 

Congress cannot, of course, determine U.S. policy, but it can send a clear political message to the White House, and more importantly to Obama’s re-election campaign. That means in particular a vigorous U.S. diplomatic campaign against any efforts at the United Nations this fall to establish a Palestinian “state.” This vigorous public approach may trouble the president’s political supporters, but their reluctance to speak up is a major factor underlying Obama’s evident belief he can muscle Israel without suffering domestic political damage. 

That needs changing quickly. Visible demonstrations of political power and support for Israel may be the only thing that constrains Obama as the 2012 presidential election grows increasingly near.

Second, there must be greater U.S. and Israeli focus and determination to reckon with Iran’s high and rising global threat, both because of Tehran’s nuclear weapons program and its support for terrorism in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Gaza, and elsewhere. Obama rarely addresses Iran’s menace, even last week when he unmercifully bullied Israel. 

No wonder Iran’s leaders view their quest for nuclear weapons as essentially unchallenged. Even while divisions within Tehran’s leadership occupy the media’s attention, its belligerent attitudes and threatening capabilities are increasing.

Third, turmoil in the Middle East is also increasingly problematic. The “Arab Spring” is not self-evidently leading to Western-style pluralistic democracy, and may well turn into something darker than what it supplanted, at least in some countries. 

The peace agreement between the Hamas terrorists and Fatah, brokered by the post-Mubarak government in Egypt, marks the effective end of any realistic peace process between Israel and the Palestinians for the foreseeable future. 

Obama has not yet grasped this reality, nor does he seem to understand that the Syrian dictatorship and Lebanon’s Hezbollah terrorists remain Iranian pawns, threats both to Israel and to the United States.Accordingly, now is hardly the time to force Israel into unnatural efforts at “peace processing” with the usual suspects. 

Now that Netanyahu has spoken, it is time for Americans and Europeans concerned with true peace and security in the Middle East to carry the debate forward.

Former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton, is a Fox News contributor and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, is the author of "Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations" (Simon & Schuster, 2007).

Don't Threaten -- Do it!

Is it possible that a ray of light, a moment of sanity and lucidity is indeed upon us. Between the vote in Sudan and this new development, I just might go dancing.

Is real UN reform upon us? Perhaps with the new Republican House. Lord knows it's long overdue. How can we continue to underwrite the machine that advances the islamization of the West and imposes the sharia (Islamic law), the most radical and intolerant ideology on the planet? The UN is the collective negation of humanity where no free man is safe and no evildoer need worry.

The former US Ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, has been urging reform for years, while Obama has co-sponsored a resolution to restrict free speech in accordance with Islamic blasphemy laws.

Bolton 2012. We need serious. We need brilliant. We need statesman. We need patriot. We need proud American. We need Bolton. We better get going.

John Bolton, over at AEI here:

  ....arguing that the decades of effort to reform the U.N. budget system have come up all but empty, and that the best available course is for the United States to insist on a switch to voluntary contributions.

The accumulated evidence of decades proves that only a major shift in attitudes within the U.N. system can lay the foundation for sustained improvements in U.N. performance, accountability, and transparency. That shift must entail breaking the grip of one-country, one-vote decision making and the entitlement mentality that have long pervaded the U.N. system. There is only one reform that can accomplish these objectives: shifting from today's predominant financing system, which relies on assessed contributions to defray the costs of U.N. agency budgets, to voluntary contributions.

Bolton argues that some of the more effective independent U.N. agencies operate on the basis of voluntary contributions and that such a change need not cripple the organization. He acknowledges, as he must, that there is almost no support for this reform within the broader U.N. membership and that it would only occur if the United States threatened to withhold its annual  payments. That threat would in turn engender a gigantic diplomatic fight that no administration focused on substantive policy goals would choose lightly. The chances of the Obama administration doing so are precisely zero. But the chance that Congressional Republicans might pick a fight with the Obama adminstration over the idea is considerably higher. As Bolton warns, "The Obama administration and the Democratic majorities in Congress should consider their options carefully before deciding to oppose withholding on principle." (FP here)

Republicans Threaten to Withhold UN Funding Newsmax

U.S. Republicans threatened Tuesday to use their new power as the majority in the House of Representatives to withhold funding for the United Nations as they accused the world body of waste and bias.
The chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, said she would reintroduce legislation that would condition U.S. contributions to the U.N. on "real, sweeping reform," including changing the U.N. budget so that member governments can offer to fund only the programs they like.
"That way, U.S. taxpayers can pay for the U.N. programs and activities that advance our interests and values, and if other countries want different things to be funded, they can pay for it themselves," she said in a statement read at a hearing on U.N. reform.
Ros-Lehtinen organized the meeting, but could not attend at the last minute because her mother was ill.
The United States has had a history of being reluctant to pay its U.N. dues, with critics of the world body charging it has a bloated and sometimes corrupt bureaucracy.
But the criticism is being revived on Capitol Hill just at a time when lawmakers are looking for ways to reduce the United States' trillion-dollar-plus deficit.
"The U.N. should be one of our prime targets for reducing expenditures in order to bring down this deficit in the next few years," Representative Dana Rohrbacher, a California Republican, told the hearing.
U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky said the world body shared U.S. goals of a stronger, more efficient, effective and accountable United Nations. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon would visit Washington and meet with congressional leaders, Nesirky said, but no date has been set.
DEMOCRATS AGREE REFORM IS NEEDED
Currently, contributions to the U.N. are levied by the U.N. and countries are obliged to pay the percentage they are assessed. The assessments are uneven, with the United States paying billions while dozens of countries pay less than $35,000 a year, Brett Schaefer of the conservative Heritage Foundation think-tank told the hearing.
Ros-Lehtinen complained of waste, mismanagement and bias at institutions such as the U.N. Human Rights Council, which she said was "dominated by human rights violators." The council's membership includes Cuba, China, and Russia.
In fiscal year 2009 the United States, which is the biggest donor to the United Nations, contributed over $6 billion despite high unemployment and skyrocketing government deficits, she said.
Ros-Lehtinen also introduced U.N. reform legislation in the last, Democratic-majority Congress. But as a committee chair she is now in a better position to advance her priorities.
Although her committee does not control spending, it writes a policy blueprint for House appropriators who do. Ultimately, however, House decisions on spending will have to be agreed with the Democratic-majority Senate.
Democrats agreed on Tuesday that U.N. reform was needed, but said the United States should "work inside the U.N. with like-minded nations," as the ranking Democrat on the panel, Representative Howard Berman, put it.
Berman castigated the Human Rights Council's "obsession with and biased treatment of Israel." But he said the United Nations often played an essential role in supporting U.S. interests, for example by sending peacekeepers to troubled areas and passing resolutions such as last year's sanctions on Iran over its disputed nuclear program. (Additional reporting by Lou Charbonneau and Patrick Worsnip in New York; Editing by Jackie Frank)