Fox News contributor John Bolton hasn’t forgotten he wants to bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran. But he seems to be gambling Americans won’t remember that he’s using the same rhetoric that lied us into the tragic, unnecessary invasion of Iraq.
Bolton, visited Fox’s Happening Now today to discuss his New York Times op-ed urging us to bomb Iran - in the name of peace.
Bolton has been salivating for war with Iran – and we’d better not wait too long! – since at least 2007. Now, Bolton has trotted out the same “mushroom cloud” fear mongering and the same “everyone is going to love this war” happy talk that was used when the Bush administration (which Bolton was a part of) during the selling of the Iraq invasion.
BOLTON: The choice is between a nuclear-weapons capable Iran which it will be with or without the agreement President Obama’s negotiating - …vs. the pre-emptive military attack. That’s the contrast and I would say a nuclear Iran is far more dangerous.
Host Jenna Lee asked, “Let’s just say that this (bombing) happens… what could America expect the next day? What would happen?”
Why, it’s all good – or it should be!
BOLTON: In Arab capitals all over the region and Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Cairo, there’d be celebrations because the Arabs don’t want Iran to get nuclear weapons any more than Israel does.
Bolton argued that if Israel undertakes “this preemptive attack, …they would be worried that the most likely Iranian response would be to unleash Hezbollah and Hamas to attack civilian targets in Israel.” Therefore, he claimed, “it’s critical” for the U.S. “immediately to come to Israel’s support, by supplying planes and other equipment.”
Bolton swatted aside as “ridiculous” and “flatly wrong” contentions that such an action would unleash a regional war.
BOLTON: As I said before, the Arab states would welcome a successful destruction of Iran’s nuclear program. In fact, the real danger that we see today, because of President Obama’s negotiations, is that he has accelerated the nuclear arms race that we could have expected once Iran tested a nuclear weapon. That’s all been brought forward. The Saudis, the Egyptians, the Turks, perhaps others, already looking at a nuclear capability to protect themselves against a nuclear Iran. That’s the real danger here.
Iran itself – I think you would see a popular opposition to the regime, if only the United States and others would help it. I think we could bring the regime down.
Lee questioned whether bombing wouldn’t backfire and make us lose the support of the opposition.
Nope, they’ll just love us!
BOLTON: That view assumes the people of Iran are unaware of what their own interests are. I think they actually understand that the regime’s pursuit of nuclear weapons endangers them and the whole country. The regime is terribly unpopular, it’s made 35 years of economic mistakes. The young people who comprise nearly 70% of the population, the people under 30, know they could have a far different lifestyle and they want it and there’s enormous ethnic discontent as well. I think the opposition needs outside help and I think that a program designed to follow on to the very precise attacks on the nuclear fuel cycle locations in Iran would produce a popular uprising.
Lee asked some good questions of Bolton but she failed to reveal that he is at least an informal policy advisor to presidential candidate Ted Cruz. Nor did she note how Bolton’s rhetoric is so reminiscent of the Iraq war rhetoric – that turned out to be so disastrously wrong.
Remember that definition of insanity? You can watch Bolton saying the same things and expecting different results below, from today's Happening Now.
“I WOULD support any military action where Bolton, Hannity, Limbaugh and all the Republican Chicken Hawks in Congress lead the charge into battle……”
By sending THEIR military aged children, grandchildren or other loved ones FIRST — but alas, us THINKING Americans who post here (including me) know very well that will NEVER, EVER HAPPEN — and even if by some wild chance it did, I can guarantee you this much: the instant they’re shot at or have a bomb, a grenade, an IED or an RPG go off near them, THEY WILL INSTANTLY S**T IN THEIR PANTS AND DIG FOXHOLES DEEP ENOUGH TO REACH CHINA!
Exhibit A, the U.S. after the 9/11 attack. But we’re hardly the only country where something similar has happened.
Bolton is a knowledgeable guy, and the fact that he still believes in this utterly discredited fantasy is astonishing.
We can argue about Iran and nuclear weapons and the pros and cons of trying to obliterate their facilities militarily, but the idea that doing this would result in the population rising up and achieving “regime change” is just pure nutbaggery. In any case, polls have repeatedly shown that the Iranian people are fully behind the idea of their country having nuclear weapons.
This pales in comparison to what awaits us if we follow Bolton’s plan. This would be the bloodiest war since Korea. The Iranian troops aren’t going to throw down their weapons and run away like the Iraqis did.
I WOULD support any military action where Bolton. Hannity, Limbaugh and all the Republican Chicken Hawks in Congress lead the charge into battle….as if!