John Bolton was a former National Security Advisor of the United States to President Trump from April 2018 to September 2019. He spent many of his 453 days in the room where it happened at President Trump’s side and he provided commentary on Trump’s presidency as well as his record in politics in both the Ronald Reagan (as Assistant Attorney General) and George W. Bush (as the United Nations ambassador) administrations. In his book, The Room Where it Happened: A White house Memoir described President Trump as a corrupt, incompetent, unethical, lack of knowledge, and a reckless leader who abuses his power to advance his personal and political needs rather than the nation’s interests. It is a comprehensive and substantial account of the Trump Administration. According to the author’s judgment, “I don’t think he’s fit for office. I don’t think he has the competence to carry out the job.” Let’s take into account the important events in the story.
It all started when Bolton’s long march to the West Wing as Trump and others pursue him for the National Security job. According to the author “Trump is Trump”. He came to understand that Trump thinks he could run the Executive Branch and establish national-security policies relying on his instincts, personal relationship with foreign leaders, and with the help of television showmanship alone. Trump and most of his team are incompetent and don’t even read the government’s “operator’s manual” and the president appointing people that were “lack-of-experience” or no experience at all to be in his office. The transition’s spreading disorder increasingly reflected not just organizational failures but Trump’s decision-making style. Krauthammer a sharp critic of Trump even commented that his behavior as of that eleven-year-old boy. And so, Trump’s transition ended with no visible prospect of Bolton, joining the Administration. Bolton concluded that if Trump’s post-inaugural decision-making process was as unconventional and erratic as his selections so it was fine that he will stay outside’s Trump’s Administration.
Less than a month into the Administration, confusion, and disorder, unfortunately, marked the NSC staff in the Administration’s first three weeks including Mike Flynn’ resignation as National Security Advisor because Trump loses confidence on him due to alleged remarks to Russian Ambassador Sergei KisIyak and CIA Director Mike Pompeo denying critical clearance of Flynn’s choices to be Senior Director. This was also followed by FBI Director James Comey being fired by Trump and meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and allegedly being less cautious discussing classified material. Later on, due to several meetings and discussions with John Bolton and President Trump; he was appointed as the National Security Advisor. John Bolton made several decisions including appointing some credible NSC staff replacing those incompetent ones.
Bolton was in the Oval Office, in the conference rooms, in the meetings with foreign leaders, even at the dinner-summit tables in Washington and abroad. According to the Author who already worked for Reagan, Bush 41, and Bush 43, “the differences between his presidency and previous ones I had served were stunning”. This statement pertains to the President who thought foreign policy is like closing a real estate deal and as a result the U.S. lost an opportunity to face its deepening threats like in China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. The author describing the President that is addicted to chaos, who embraced enemies and turn down friends, and was deeply suspicious of his government. There was a time when a Russian hit squad attacked former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in England and America should respond to this attack. However, Trump on the other hand even congratulated President Putin on winning the presidential election again. Nonetheless, Trump later expelled over sixty Russian “diplomats” as part of the NATO-wide effort to show solidarity with London.
In another meeting, the President was begging for Xi Jinping for political assistance and support in the election just as he had expressed support for Ukrainian political favor and a Russian email dump in 2016. President Trump told President Xi Jinping that help him win re-election by buying American agricultural products, which would help him in farm states. According to the author, there’s a phone call between Xi Jinping about trade matters, however, Trump shifted the conversation to the coming U.S. presidential election. The author also mentioned that the trade is all about the Chinese telecommunications giant namely ZTE that was sentenced in evading sanctions on Iran and North Korea that lead to penalties due to further violations. And Trump offered Xi Jinping to lighten the penalties.
On the other hand, the North Korean dictator Kim Jung Un said in the February 2019 summit that he didn’t want Trump to do anything that would harm him politically which Bolton said that it was a great idea. The President’s interest in the authoritarian leaders made him encouraged oppressing and discriminating people on account of their religious beliefs. The success of Xi Jinping with his ally Vladimir Putin took the attention and admiration of Trump. And also, to Trump’s almost paternal affection for the North Korean President Kim Jong-Un which Bolton disagreed about. The author even described it as a “foolish act” when Trump agreed to meet Kim Jung-Un in Singapore. However, Trump met with South Korean President Moon Jae-in on April 11, 2019, discussing North Korea’s nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs after two failed summits with Kim Jong-Un. The North Korean President simply strung the U.S. along through several futile trips as Trump haplessly pursued a nuclear disarmament deal that never stood a chance of materializing. On the other hand, the author noted that Trump told Erdoğan that he would negotiate on behalf of a Turkish state-owned bank being investigated by U.S. prosecutors he described as “Obama people” because of the multibillion-dollar scheme that invades American sanctions in Iran. In fact, according to Bolton during the Buenos Aires summit in late 2018, President Tayyip Erdoğan handed Mr. Trump a memo by the law firm and even if Trump didn’t even read it, he declared that the bank was innocent. The author thinks that Trump was just trying to show he had as much arbitrary authority as Erdoğan, who had said twenty years earlier as mayor of Istanbul, “Democracy is like a streetcar. You ride it to the stop you want and then you get off”. The president often departs from the discussion on Afghanistan to complain about paying for NATO, and he even pointed out what Erdoğan was doing in Turkey. On another occasion, Fiona Hill was Bolton’s senior director for Europe and Russia and Deputy Assistant to the President yet the author noted that the President didn’t even recognize her at all. The president even asked her to take note during an Oval Office meeting thinking that she was a secretary. The author even confirmed that there was a testimony offered by Fiona Hill that he declined the “drug deal” being planned by Trump’s colleagues forcing Ukraine to help.
Money should always be a recurring topic for Trump, however, he told Bolton that other presidents seemed to not talk about it but he likes to do so. He constantly complains about the European countries who are not fulfilling their obligation to contribute 2% of their GDP to defense. The author noted that the President would illustrate his claims with a reference like the cost of helicoptering Afghani children to school in Taliban-penetrated areas, deplore aid in going to Nigeria for the reason that the country wasn’t buying U.S. agricultural produce. Money was the greatest reason for another persistent refrain—to get out. According to the author, Trump would persistently say that America should get out of Syria, Afghanistan, Africa, Germany, Poland (even though the deferential government there had told him it would christen a new base “Fort Trump”), and Ukraine. However, Bolton and his colleagues repeatedly found themselves declining to Trump’s determination to withdraw from NATO. For Bolton, doesn’t like entangling international agreements and supranational institutions. He noted that it is important to check great opponents like China and Russia and to crush genocidal regimes like former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. But Trump kept on responding to that idea with an irritated shrug saying “I want to get out of everything!”.
On some occasions, Bolton and Trump blended on different matters including Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or the Iran Nuclear Deal negotiated in 2015 was unfit for purpose, the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) between the U.S. and Russia that it was only observed by America and America’s economic and geopolitical relations with China determines the shape of international affairs in the 21st century. Boston and Trump also shared the same sentiments on the liberal view of China in becoming freer and democratic even if they disagreed in terms of the flattery of Trump towards Xi Jinping.
On other instances, Bolton noted that Trump wanted dirt on the son of former Vice President and presumptive Democratic Party presidential nominee Joe Biden. President Trump linked his suspension of $391 million in security aid for Ukraine just to make Ukraine publicly announce investigations into the wrongdoing of Democrats involving Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. Even if Bolton, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper persuaded Trump to release the aid because Ukraine needs it to defend itself against the war with Russia-sponsored forces. However, according to the author, Trump said that he wasn’t in favor of sending them anything until all the Russia-investigation materials related to Hillary Clinton and Biden will be turned over.
And 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 according to Bolton that it did almost immediately. Criticism starts with the Administration’s early, relentless assertion that the disease was “contained” and that it would not have an economic effect. Even if Boston made it clear that global health should remain a top priority but still the actions remained unchanged.
While liberals and Democrats focus on impeachment, conservatives and Republicans should worry about the removal of the political guardrail of Trump having to face reelection. Bolton’s resignation was long in maturing as the absurdities and humiliations mounted. With a lot of allegations and Trump told Boston that he was a leaker and complaining about the opposition in the Taliban meeting made Bolton resigned and left the room where it all happened. He left the White House as thorny, prideful, and hawkish as he went in. But with the publication of this memoir, he has done his state a belated service and many of Trump’s national security decisions hinged more on political than on philosophy, strategy, or foreign policy and defense rationales.
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