He has priorities to move us all backward

John Bolton has distinguished himself as a Nineteenth Century man. Enamored with the idea of gunboat diplomacy, he believes that America has the capacity but not the will to solve every problem on Earth. He would do that by sending in the marines, believing that they will do short work of every situation, and return home as triumphantly as when they captured Manuel Noriega of Panama and brought him to face justice in the United States.

Eying a job of high importance and heavy responsibility in the upcoming Donald Trump administration, Bolton wrote an article under the title: “Next president's foreign policy priorities,” published on November 12, 2016 in the Pittsburgh Tribune. After the customary repudiation of the current administration's policies, he put down what he sees as the international problems that the new administration will face upon taking office.

John Bolton wastes no time establishing himself as the man who should be in charge of foreign policy. To this end, he formulates an argument that is right out the Nineteenth Century mode of thinking. Here is a sample: “The road to the White House will be as nothing compared to the foreign threats and challenges Trump now faces … Barack Obama's policies have left the United States in worldwide jeopardy on many fronts”.

There is no doubt that when he sat to write this article, John Bolton had Henry Kissinger in mind. What happened eons ago, is that the world was in the throws of a Cold War, and strategic thinking was paramount on everyone's mind. Whether or not Kissinger had political ambitions is of no importance, but what he did was write a book on national security. It became the gold standard of its day because the world was dominated by fears that resulted from the massive nuclear arsenals that were available to NATO and to the Warsaw Pact.

It was the strength, clarity and intelligence of Henry Kissinger – apparent in his parsing of the problems, and his identification of the opportunities that existed at the time – which made his book a must-read to anyone aspiring to work in the field. He discussed each point from every angle, earning praise from those who had extensive experience in National Security matters. And that's what motivated then President-elect Richard Nixon to give Kissinger a call and offer him a position on his National Security team.

To paraphrase a famous saying: “John Bolton, you're no Henry Kissinger.” And you, the reader, cannot help but remember that saying when you see how Bolton discusses the current problems and opportunities. He does that after laying out a preamble which says the man is too hungry for that job and too backward to be in charge of the office. Here is that preamble: “If our international perils are not addressed soon and systematically, they will worsen with even direr consequences later”.

This done, he identifies 5 areas in which he says the Obama Administration did poorly, but does not say how to correct the policies that were adopted. However, he hints at what he might do if put in charge of them, thus gives sufficient reason to make you see that he is uniquely unqualified to join the National Security team. That's because he will be bad for the world, and worse for America.

His first priority, he says, is to associate the activities of rebellious kids pretending to defend the Muslim religion with the mainstream adherents of that religion. In so doing, he will charge all Muslims with the responsibility for the damage that's caused by kids. He sees nothing wrong in making Muslims everywhere guilty of activities they do not commit and cannot control.

It is not hard to see that the consequence of implementing the Bolton plan will be to drag other religions into the back-and-forth. What he overlooks is that religious haggles of this kind are based on emotions that no rational argument can tame. They can get out of hand, thus help realize what the kids said they hoped to accomplish. John Bolton may ultimately prove to be so backward looking as to have played in the hands of kids; doing so to the detriment of social tranquility in America.

Bolton's second priority is nuclear proliferation. He paints a horrific picture of what he says is bound to happen without offering a solution beyond saying: “Moving vigorously to eliminate the rising proliferation tidal wave will either be the hallmark of Trump's presidency – or possibly its epitaph.” He did not have to do more than use the word “vigorously” to tell what he has in mind. He is a lawyer, and when lawyers use that word, they signal their readiness to go on the offensive.

As it happens, Bolton has already discussed what he will do in that file. He will hand it entirely to Netanyahu of Israel, and give him the heaviest bunker busting bombs in America's arsenal as well as the B-52s that can carry them. He will tell America's commander-in-chief to step aside, shut up and let Netanyahu effectuate regime change in Iran so as to make America great again. Well, my friend, if trying to do this much in Iraq by W. Bush caused the horror we see in the Levant today, imagine what will happen after an attack on an Iran that has several times the size and might of Sadam's Iraq.

Bolton's third priority is Russia's expanding influence in Eastern Europe and the Middle East. His fourth priority is China's expanding influence in the South and East China Seas. What Bolton is doing with regard to these files, is hallucinate. To fantasize that America can now contain these two powers the way it did a Soviet Union that came out the Second World War a Third World country while China was at the Stone Age level – is to delude himself. Pitting America now against two superpowers-in-the-making will bankrupt America the way that the Soviet Union went bankrupt just before collapsing.

Bolton's fifth priority is global governance. Gripped by the mentality of the Nineteenth Century, the man is incapable of seeing that the way to preserve life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for yourself is not to do it by pressing your boots against someone's neck. It is to cooperate with others in an effort to secure at least a modicum of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all.

This will require the setting up of multinational organizations whose task will be to open lines of communication among all the nations and all the groups within them, so that everyone may live their lives as they see fit without the fear that an army of soldiers bent on conquest, or an army of refugees fleeing mayhem will invade them and disrupt their lives. But that's not how John Bolton sees things.

Instead of interpreting Britain's vote to leave Europe, and South Africa's decision to withdraw from the International Criminal Court (ICC) as a sign that lack of adequate communication is creating discord among the nations of the world and among their peoples, John Bolton sees those events as a sign that people want to distance themselves from each other.

The fact is that the Brits voted to leave Europe because they were afraid of being invaded by refugees who will disrupt their lives. As to the African governments withdrawing from the ICC, they so decided because the ICC has targeted mostly African leaders and very few “White folks.” It let many other Whites off the hook. The Africans see this as a backdoor way to usher a new colonial era that will see their countries exploited economically.

The solution to this sort of problems is to create multinational organizations that will foster the exchange of views between nations to alleviate the fear they may have of each other. It is not to grow apart even further like says John Bolton, something that will create even more fear; the kind that will degenerate into paranoia.