John Bolton
Subject: Bolton on the War in Iran
Bio: Trump’s former National Security Advisor
Transcript:
Larry Bernstein:
Welcome to What Happens Next. My name is Larry Bernstein. What Happens Next is a podcast which covers economics, politics, and history. Today’s topic is Bolton on the War in Iran.
John Bolton was the National Security Advisor in Trump’s first term. I want to know from John if attacking Iran is a good idea? Whether it is legal under international law and is constitutional? How he would handle the diplomacy with our allies if he were back in charge, and how this will end up?
John, did the decision to attack Iran makes sense?
John Bolton:
The case for overthrowing the regime is very strong. I thought this for decades now. The regime of the Ayatollahs is determined to have deliverable nuclear weapons and to support terrorism around the world.
Consecutive American administrations have tried to change their behavior. They have failed. The threat continues both on the nuclear and the terrorism side. If you cannot change a regime’s behavior, the alternative is to change the regime. This is the objective that is absolutely required for peace and security in the Middle East.
Larry Bernstein:
Is it appropriate to do a surprise attack like the US and Israel did to decapitate the regime?
John Bolton:
Yes, because the structure of the Iranian regime, much like governments and other countries, puts these leadership positions in the chain of command, starting with the Supreme Leader. The Iranian regime does everything they can to hide their activities from us. To deal with that concealment and camouflage, this attack is both necessary and appropriate.
Larry Bernstein:
I was stunned at the simultaneous nature of the attack and its success, which showed both a technical military as well as a fabulous intelligence effort. What did you make of that initial salvo?
John Bolton:
I agree with your assessment. For the first four days about as well as anybody could expect. It does show the best military planning, both by the US and in coordination with Israel.
On the intelligence side, there is no guarantee that’s going to continue, but the planning on the operational side stands in stark contrast to what I’m worried about which is a lack of planning on the political and diplomatic side, which is correctable, but we should have been underway months before the actual attack began.
Larry Bernstein:
Let’s start with diplomacy. This was an operation done by the United States and Israel and some of the Gulf States who were supportive, but it did not include Europe our normal allies. With the war in Iraq, we spent a year managing the diplomatic aspects to make sure that other nations were supportive. What are you making of the decision not to engage with these other nations prior to the attack?
John Bolton:
This is one of the mistakes that endangers the ultimate outcome. I’m very much supportive of achieving the objectives, this is a criticism that’s intended to be helpful. We could have argued very effectively to the Europeans. They are more threatened right now by Iran’s missile capabilities than we are. The Iranians have intermediate range ballistic missiles that can hit significant parts of the European Union. They can’t hit us yet. They can obviously hit Israel and the Gulf Arabs.
The Europeans have been the target of Iranian terrorism over the years as we have in this country. So they have a stake in this too. As I speak to people, I am getting the impression that they would like to go along if they could find an excuse to do it.
But we did not engage in diplomacy, as far as I can tell. And right now, interestingly, three additional governments have come out in support of the strikes: Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. It can still be corrected. We can go to Japan, South Korea, and others that we have not contacted and urge that we’re in this together. We can find a way to bring political support.
Larry Bernstein:
Does it suggest that our NATO allies have not been that helpful in the last Middle Eastern war?
John Bolton:
The Europeans have had a different view of Iran for a long time, and it’s a mistaken view. They have been the ones pressing for agreements on the nuclear weapons issue. Their pattern on Iran has not been helpful. That said, we should still have gone after them because we want to minimize the political disagreement, and we will need them in the aftermath if we get a successful outcome and a new regime is established. So, it’s an exercise that doesn’t guarantee our success, but failing to do it enhances the chances that if things go wrong, the allies are going to turn their back on us and say, “We told you so.”
Larry Bernstein:
Political theory suggests that nation states what will do what’s in their political interests. If this is in their political interests, they’ll support us even without diplomatic dialogue.
John Bolton:
Well, sometimes you must persuade people what’s in their interest. And in Europe, and you can see it in the government of Prime Minister Starmer of the United Kingdom, they’re just obsessed with this idea that somehow it violates international law. Emmanuel Macron, the President of France was the first out of the gate with that argument. I happen to believe that’s incorrect, but we should have been engaging with them on that to at least minimize that argument. The diplomats who would be involved in all this persuasion are not preparing for combat. They would not have been diverted from other tasks. This would have been a particularly good use of their time.
Larry Bernstein:
The same argument about international law is also used in our domestic politics. What do you make of Senator Kaine and Schumer’s arguments that this would violate international law and was unconstitutional?
John Bolton:
Well, they are wrong on both counts. But let me say the failure to encourage and educate Congress on the reason for this attack, not with sharing operational secrets, but building the political environment is something that I think the administration failed to do.
This is an action that most Republicans agree with; they’re going to get broad support. Their big problem is, as usual, the Democrats and the isolationist wing of MAGA, but they didn’t do anything in the front end to alleviate support. The idea that the administration is compelled to ask Congress for a declaration of war as a matter of constitutional law is flatly wrong.
In our history, we’ve probably fought 200 wars or more depending on how you define the term war. We have declared war exactly five times. The War of 1812, the Mexican American War, the Spanish American War, World War I and World War II. You might well ask, “Well, where’s Congress been since World War II? Since 1941, the last time they got up enough energy to declare war.” So that’s the constitutional argument.
If you are going to take an action like this, you should consider building your political strength, as George H.W. Bush did in his campaign against Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait, go to Congress and get an authorization to use force. You may conclude you can’t get a resolution like that, but I don’t think there’s any evidence that the White House even thought about doing it here. And I might say on George W. Bush’s behalf, he believed even if he had failed to get a resolution authorizing force from Congress, even if we had failed to get a UN Security Council resolution, which I spent a lot of time working on, he was prepared to attack Iraq anyway and risk impeachment.
Larry Bernstein:
If the Democrats are successful in getting the House at the midterm election, they will probably impeach Trump for if not this, something else. Given the antagonism and partisanship that’s going on right now, why do you think that was a good use of Trump’s time to try to persuade the Democrats. As an example, Senator John Fetterman, I met personally with him, since the invasion, and he was matter of fact to say that this makes total sense. The Trump administration had not met with him in advance, but he concluded that on his own. It seems that either you believe in the mission, or you don’t.
John Bolton:
I’m a lawyer. I believe in advocacy. I believe you can change people’s mind. Trump will have almost unanimous Republican support. There’ll be one or two libertarians in Congress who flake off. Jim Baker always used the old phrase, “in on the takeoff, in on the landing.” And that as a political matter if you conclude it’s not worth the effort that you’ll have leaks, then you don’t do it. Trump can still do it now and we will have to see what transpires.
I do think efforts to pass War Powers Act resolutions are going to fail in Congress and that will be giving breathing space.
Larry Bernstein:
In any war, the other side gets a vote and how they decide to define the war effort. The Iranians have chosen some strange decisions. They lobbed a missile at Cyprus, which is a member of the European Union and that was a British base they hit. When you mentioned before that Starmer decided he may take the position that he doesn’t want to participate, it’s going to be more challenging after they hit their forces and kill their men.
They hit a dozen different Middle Eastern countries. Why do you think Iran decided to fire off so many missiles and so many different people?
John Bolton:
I can’t understand it. The attack on Cyprus what is called a sovereign base area. When the British gave Cypress independence, they kept two bases that are sovereign British territory. So, the United Kingdom has been directly attacked here. There are reports of NATO defenses in Turkey shooting down a drone or a missile approaching Turkish airspace. That’s another thing that’s hard to understand.
The attacks on the Arab countries, completely contrary to any logic I can understand because now the Gulf Arabs are going to have to come in with us. They want this regime to fall, make no mistake about it. They just wanted it done without any pain and strain, which I can understand, although that was never going to happen. But now they have to show their own citizens that they’re not going to put up with deliberate attacks on civilian targets.
We’re past the point where somebody can say these were mistakes. The volume of attacks and the clear aim points show what Iran was doing. It just hastens the demise of the regime. It doesn’t make either political or military sense what they’ve done. I don’t have an explanation.
Larry Bernstein:
If you were advising the military about what it should be targeting, is there anything that they’re not thinking about beyond the obvious?
John Bolton:
There is a division of labor, where the Israelis are taking out leadership targets and we’re going after military targets. For the Israelis, regime change is the number one paramount objective.
Our strategy looks to be proceeding is to destroy the instruments of Iranian state power that threatens us and the near neighbors of Iran in the region, and the instruments that suppress and brutalize the civilian population in Iran.
As you degrade their capabilities, you demonstrate that the Iranian state itself is disintegrating. And you want the conclusion to spread that its days are numbered. It cannot defend itself. It’s only a matter of time until it falls.
The air campaign alone will not bring it down, but it’s intended to enable the fracturing of the regime at the top and to work with the opposition to bring over elements of the army. And this highlights to me where I’m worried that they have not adequately cooperated with the opposition.
We need to know what they’re doing, what they’re capable of, what contacts are they making inside the regime to try and bring people across to their side? What can they tell us about how we might help in that regard? How do we coordinate this? And then at some point begin to think about the day after.
Now, we have press reports that the president spoke to the two main Kurdish leaders in Iraq representing two major families, and they basically run the Iraqi Kurdish region for the last 30 plus years. We know from press reports back in January during the demonstrations, the administration supplied roughly 6,000 Starlink terminals to help the opposition communication.
I just hope that they’re doing a lot more to get together with the opposition and figure out how we can mutually support each other.
Larry Bernstein:
The axis of evil incorporates Russia, North Korea, Iran. I’m not sure China fits in those criteria, but do we expect that those beautiful friendships will result in any mutual support of Iran or not?
John Bolton:
North Korea is not a factor here. We know that China is a major purchaser of Iranian oil in violation of our sanctions reflecting China’s status as an energy poor country that desperately needs supplies of oil. They have provided anti-ship missiles, including a contract recently signed as reported in the press. I don’t know whether that material has been delivered, but we think as well aid with the Iranian ballistic missile program and a range of other capabilities, perhaps including cyber warfare, which both countries are engaged in. As of four days after the beginning of the attacks, I don’t know of any evidence of new Chinese support.
It may be that they’re still trying to figure out what they’re going to do, but as of now, it’s more support assistance that they’ve given before the attack than they’ve given after. So, what they do next remains an unknown. Russia, I don’t think, has the capability to do much. They didn’t have the capability to do much in Venezuela, and I don’t think they have the capability to do much in the case of Cuba, which could be another adversary regime of ours falling in the near future. There have been diplomatic contacts between the foreign ministers of Russia and Iran.
Russia’s spread too thin in Ukraine as when the Assad regime fell in Syria a couple years ago, the Russians didn’t have the bandwidth to come to their aid. Iran is in deep trouble. We know their foreign ministers been going from country to country around the world in a tin cup exercise, asking for help, not getting much of a response.
Larry Bernstein:
One of its neighbors is India. They’ve historically had a decent relationship with Iran. What role do you think they will play in this war?
John Bolton:
India lives in a complex neighborhood and their main adversary is China. They have close relationships with Russia, although they shouldn’t. And they have developed relationships with Iran in part because they see the threat from Pakistan that India deals with all the time is something that Iran can help them with.
My guess is that India will stay as far away from this as they can politically. India is a country that’s of enormous strategic importance to the United States for the rest of this century because of China. We should be on the phone right now with them.
Larry Bernstein:
How is this going to play out?
John Bolton:
The main objectives are to kill as many top leaders as possible in Iran and to destroy all of Iran’s ballistic missiles and drones. It explains why Trump said a few days ago that the big hits are still to come. There are things we want to do, but first we want to eliminate the retaliatory strike capabilities that Iran has.
Larry Bernstein:
Will the regime fall?
John Bolton:
Some would say the regime is falling every time the Israelis drop another bomb. Hegseth and Trump said something similar. And this is another worry I have. I do not think that Iran is not Venezuela, and I don’t think even in Venezuela removing Maduro but not the rest of the regime is a lasting solution. Trump made comments that some of the people we could have accepted as successors to the Supreme Leader were killed in the initial attacks.
I don’t know who the successor will be. It looks this morning like it may be his son, but with the Ayatollah removed, you could pick anonymous Ayatollah, wouldn’t make the slightest bit of difference just as fanatic and dangerous. If we killed people that the White House thought they could deal with when the military activity stopped, then we were playing the wrong hand.
This regime’s been in power for 47 years and they are not going to go easily, but the optimal outcome would be a military government, not by the Revolutionary Guard, that could restore order and then hopefully hold the ring while the Iranian people through whatever consultative process they chose came up with the new regime. I don’t see how we can accept a paler version of the Islamic Revolution, unless we’re prepared to deal again with the nuclear program and the threat of international terrorism. Regime change is the answer.
Larry Bernstein:
The Shah of Iran’s son has thrown his hat in the ring. When we say we want to begin negotiations with someone, who is that guy?
John Bolton:
It’s going to be the leadership inside the opposition in Iran. It is fragmented, which shows that you can’t wipe out a handful of people and see the opposition collapse.
I don’t think that anybody’s going to rise up. We’ve learned this in the case of Iraq, that a bunch of people who have been sitting in Los Angeles are going to waltz into Tehran and take over the government that is not going to happen. And we shouldn’t try and pick leaders now. I am not all that troubled by the fact there’s no day after plan. When we declared our independence and people signed the Constitution, they didn’t have a day after plan. They weren’t sure what was going to happen. And somehow, we muddled through. I think the Iranians can too. I’m not underestimating the difficulties, but I do think in the case of Iran, it’s very hard to see that any other government would be worse than what we have now.
Larry Bernstein:
What will this war do with our relations with the other countries in the Middle East?
John Bolton:
The Arab countries want this regime change to happen. They, 15 years ago, came to the conclusion that the biggest threat to them was the Islamic Republic, both through its terrorist program and pursuit of nuclear weapons. That strategic assessment by the Gulf Arabs was almost identical to Israel’s strategic assessment of the threats to Israel. That’s what permitted the Abraham Accords. That was the tectonic shift in perception in the region that has led to the possibility of widespread diplomatic relations between Israel and all the Arab countries. There are issues like the Palestinians to resolve, but if you remove the Iranian threat, indeed, if you put in a normal government, then there’s real possibility for progress toward a stable Middle East that would benefit everybody. So, they want this. They didn’t want trouble incurred, but I think that was never realistic. And I don’t think the damage they’ve suffered to date is inordinate. Let’s hope it stays that way.
Larry Bernstein:
Of their Iranian proxies, only Hezbollah decided to join in. What risk did they take for their continued presence in Lebanon?
John Bolton:
The Lebanese government has been clearer than it has been in a long time that Hezbollah’s activities are unacceptable. And the way to root out Hezbollah is there has to be some relationship between Israel and the government of Lebanon. It’s very hard for the Lebanese to accept, but it’d be better to do that than continue to put up with Hezbollah.
Larry Bernstein:
The last Iran war with Israel lasted 12 days. How long did this thing last?
John Bolton:
I do not think you ought to put a limit on it. I think Trump made a mistake in the 12-day war by stopping it after we had had an incredibly successful day of dropping bunker busters. That was great. The Israelis had a target list if your arm they were still wanted to go after. Trump is saying four to five weeks, maybe more. I hope he is passed the one and done temptation. I hope he does not declare total victory tomorrow and the thing ends prematurely. Setting an artificial deadline does not make any sense. There is a great anecdote from the war in Afghanistan that applies here for the Taliban said of the Americans, “You have the watches, we have the time.” Well, I think we ought to be saying, “We have the time. We’re going to get it done right.”
Larry Bernstein:
What are you optimistic about?
John Bolton:
If there were ever a moment to try for regime change in Iran, this is it. There is never any guarantee, as Bismarck used to say, when you launch a war is rolling the iron dice, but this is the moment.
Larry Bernstein:
John, you’ve been advocating for this war. How does this make you feel personally, the fact that Trump has decided to pursue your vision?
John Bolton:
I wish I had been more persuasive in the first term, and more persuasive 20 years ago, because the world would have been spared a lot of misery that has been caused since then.
This is a tribute to Bibi Netanyahu who has been thinking about this even longer than I have.
And I know that this has been his mission for a long time. To me, it just underlines why we have got to do everything we can to be successful here and why people of whatever partisan stripe in the United States should be wishing our military and Israels every success to accomplish their mission.
Larry Bernstein:
Thanks to John for joining us. If you missed the previous podcast, the topic was Requiring English. Our speaker was Nick Griffin who is the author of The Year of Dangerous Days: Riots, Refugees, and Cocaine in Miami 1980.
This podcast was about Nick’s new play English Only.
In 1980 125,000 Cubans arrived in Miami in just two months and many of them did not speak English frustrating many native Miamians.
Nick discussed the importance of English being the lingua franca in the US and the debate on whether the Miami government should encourage its use by immigrants.
You can find our previous episodes and transcripts on our website
whathappensnextin6minutes.com. Please follow us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Thank you for joining us today, goodbye.
Check out our previous episode, Requiring English, here.
