>>186812, >>186813, >>186814, >>186815, >>186816
DataRepublican (small r) @DataRepublican - John Bolton's morals have never been clean. From my book:
In March 2002, while some diplomats explored a negotiated path with Baghdad, Washington moved to eliminate even the appearance of one. At The Hague, John Bolton, then Under Secretary of State for Arms Control, summoned José Bustani, Director-General of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). Bustani had been urging Iraq to rejoin the Chemical Weapons Convention and allow international inspectors back in—a development that could have undercut the case for war.
According to Bustani’s later account, Bolton issued a chilling warning (emphasis, again, mine):
"You have 24 hours to leave the organization, and if you don’t comply with this decision by Washington, we have ways to retaliate against you. We know where your kids live. You have two sons in New York."
Weeks later, under U.S. threats to cut funding, OPCW member states voted 48-7, with 43 abstentions, to remove Bustani—the first director in the organization’s history ever forced from office. They got the message across; Washington did not seek verification or containment but a cleared path for war.
It’s worth pausing to ask why Bolton would resort to such an extreme act because his reasoning reveals one of multiple distinct motives that converged in the march toward Iraq. Unlike President Bush, Bolton openly ridiculed democratic idealism. As he put it:
"I don’t believe in nation building. I think the United States is, in itself, still engaged in building its own nation. And for us, it’s an eternal project. I don’t believe in social engineering. That’s why I’m a conservative. And I particularly don’t believe we’re good at social-engineering other countries."
Bolton’s objection to diplomacy was grounded in national security. He believed the world was too dangerous for experiments in reform. In his own words:
"So if your objective is [to] protect the homeland, the level of risk that you’re willing to bear is going to be very small. And until the evidence changes, the presumption should be that we don’t wait to be attacked, but that we take steps actively to defend ourselves."
Most nationalists believe in prevention; Bolton believed in something like permanent preemption—the conviction that demonstrating force is itself a form of defense. For him, war was the surest deterrent to war. Better to fight abroad than risk conflict at home.
That logic explains his conduct at The Hague. When Bustani’s diplomacy threatened to reopen an inspection channel with Iraq, Bolton saw a threat to American credibility. If Saddam Hussein’s Iraq had rejoined the Chemical Weapons Convention, the rationale for preemption would disappear as quickly as the WMDs Saddam is alleged to have kept.
https://x.com/DataRepublican/status/2070534704214982993

DataRepublican (small r) @DataRepublican - Of course.
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J Michael Waller @JMichaelWaller