Review of "The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir" by John Bolton

John Bolton


When Donald Trump was elected President in 2016, he sought to get John Bolton - Republican political consultant, television commentator, writer, and former United States Ambassador to the United Nations - into his Administration.



Trump wanted Bolton on board at least in part because the commentator - a conservative hawk who seems ready to bomb any country he sees as the enemy - is an effective mouthpiece on Sunday morning talk shows, touting Republican views.

Trump and his staff waved a variety of 'consultant' positions in front of Bolton's nose, but the former Ambassador wasn't interested. He wanted a job with some clout, and finally became National Security advisor in April, 2018.

 

President Donald Trump and John Bolton

Bolton resigned seventeen months later, in September, 2019 - frustrated with Trump's erratic Presidency and tendency to elevate his personal interests above those of the country.

 

 















Upon leaving the government Bolton wrote this book, which is an extensive account of his time in the Trump Administration. Bolton provides detailed accounts of meetings with Trump, cabinet members, and bureaucrats in the United States, as well as with their counterparts in other countries. Bolton also expounds his views on US foreign policy, other members of the Trump Administration, and the President himself. Bolton's assessment of foreign leaders is telling and a little gossipy - like the times South Korea's President Moon Jae-in tried to insinuate himself into meetings between Trump and North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in
 

North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un
 
The book is well-organized, clear, and engaging, though a bit bloated - especially with travel details (I took Marine One; I flew on Air Force One; I rode in The Beast; The motorcade drove us to our hotel; My Secret Service guard drove me to the White House; etc.) Bolton is smart, well-educated, and well-read, and he sprinkles his narrative with quotes from notable figures. (Bolton may just have a big book of quotes, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt 🙂). The former National Security Advisor is also confident and self-assured - a man who thinks he's always right, and doesn't mind saying so.

Bolton's conceit put him at odds with other members of the Administration, especially:

 
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis


 United Nations Ambassador Nicki Haley



 Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin


 
Trump advisor (and son-in-law) Jared Kushner



....and Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani.

 
All these people had views and goals that didn't necessarily line up with Bolton's.

Moreover, Trump himself often side-stepped (or disregarded) Bolton's advice, leading to much frustration for the National Security Advisor. For instance, Bolton wanted to maintain a hard line - and often severe sanctions - against troublesome nations like Iran, North Korea, China, Russia, Syria, and Venezuela, while Trump hoped to make deals that helped his eternal re-election campaign. In fact Bolton cites many occasions when Trump had to be 'walked back from the ledge' before he gave away the store.

On the other hand, Bolton wanted to give assistance to Ukraine, while Trump insisted that Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky open an investigation into Hunter Biden first - a 'tit-for'tat' issue that eventually led to the impeachment hearings.


 
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky

Two of Bolton's other bugaboos are the press, which he disdains, except for Fox News and the like; and the Obama administration, which apparently never set a foot right in his view.

The juiciest parts of the book have already been extensively quoted in the media, but there's plenty more 'good stuff' in the narrative. The following quotes demonstrate some of Bolton's views.

⚫ Referring to press coverage of Trump's desire to get the United States out of Syria, Bolton writes: "All this confused press coverage reveals both the inconsistencies within Trump's own thinking, and reporting based on second- and third-hand sources, exacerbated under a President who spent a disproportionate share of his time watching his Administration being covered in the press. It is difficult beyond description to pursue a complex policy in a contentious part of the world when the policy is subject to instant modification based on the boss's perception of how inaccurate and often-already-outdated information is reported by writers who don't have the Administration's best interests at heart. It was like making and executing policy inside a pin-ball machine, not the West Wing of the White House."


 
 President Trump watching the news

⚫ Following a description of President George H.W. Bush's meticulously organized schedule, Bolton says: "I would have thought I had died and gone to heaven to have such an orderly approach to preparing for an upcoming day. As it was, Trump generally had only two intelligence briefings per week, and in most of those, he spoke at greater length than the briefers, often on matters completely unrelated to the subjects at hand.

"


 







 President George H.W. Bush

⚫ About attempting to organize a coordinated approach among government departments to Chinese phone company ZTE, which engaged in criminal behavior, Bolton says: "[The departments] would all rather take their chances with the existing policy-making roulette rather than follow process discipline. The only conclusion to emerge clearly from this moment was that international economic policy remained utterly unstructured, and this was unlikely to change without superhuman effort, not to mention a President who agreed such change would be beneficial."


 
Chinese phone company ZTE

⚫ Recalling a conversation between President Trump and President Xi Jinping of China, Bolton writes: "[Trump] then, stunningly, turned the conversation to the upcoming US presidential election, alluding to China's economic capability to affect the ongoing campaigns, pleading with Xi to ensure he'd win. He stressed the importance of farmers, and increased Chinese purchases of soybeans and wheat in the electoral outcome. Breezing by China's failure to do anything on fentanyl [which they manufacture and send to the US] and its seizure of Canadian hostages (not to mention American hostages), Trump urged that the two sides....pursue negotiations to conclude the most exciting, largest deal ever made."


 
Chinese President Xi Jinping

⚫ Writing about Trumps approach to the COVID-19 pandemic, Bolton muses, "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 it did almost immediately. And there was plenty to criticize, starting with the Administration's early, relentless assertion that the disease was 'contained' and would have little or no economic impact. Market reactions to these kinds of assertions were decidedly negative, which may finally have woken the White House up to the seriousness of the problem....Trump's reflex effort to talk his way out of anything, however, even a public-health crisis, only undercut his and the nation's credibility, with his statements looking more like political damage control than responsible public health advice."


 
President Trump talking about the COVID-19 pandemic
 
⚫ Referring to the US putting pressure on Iran and Trump's determination to leave the Iran nuclear deal, Bolton says: "Trump invariably believed our allies were not doing enough. This was certainly true on Iran. France, Germany, and the UK spent their time trying to save the Iran nuclear deal rather than pressuring the ayatollahs. Neither they nor Americans who supported Obama's deal ever believed unilateral US sanctions could devastate Iran's economy, although that was exactly their effect....Had we hard-liners persuaded Trump to bear down on [Treasury Secretary] Mnuchin, we would have seen even more economic decline in Iran, but that was not to be. Trump could initiate policies, but his lack of consistency, steadfastness, and resolve invariably undercut them."


 
President Trump takes steps to leave the Iran nuclear deal

⚫ Musing about Trump's views that he was being undercut by his own advisors, Bolton writes: "Trump often complained that people all over the world wanted to talk to him, but somehow they never got through.....Iranian President Hassan Rouhani wanted to talk, Putin wanted to talk, everyone wanted to talk to Trump, but someone was cutting him out. Of course, neither Putin nor Rouhani had made any effort to contact us, and to the extent [Iran's Foreign Minister] Zarif and others spoke to the media, they were playing to Trump's vanities. The latest variation on this theme, perfected by [North Korea's Supreme Leader] Kim Jong Un, was to criticize Trump's aides, presumably to convince Trump only he could make a difference.....Such an approach was quite astute, because that's exactly what Trump thought."


 
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani

 










Russian President Vladimir Putin

⚫ Discussing Trump's view that former Secretary of State John Kerry was trying to save the Iran nuclear deal, Bolton observes: "As was often the case when discussing Iran, Trump raised John Kerry. Trump was obsessed with the idea of prosecuting Kerry for violating the Logan Act, a rarely invoked 1799 law prohibiting private citizens from negotiating with foreign governments. Without doubt, Kerry was trying to persuade Iran to stay in the Iran nuclear deal.....That said, prosecuting him was a nonstarter. The Logan Act violates the First Amendment and, as a criminal statute, is unconstitutionally void for vagueness."


 
Former Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani had worked out a nuclear deal
 
⚫ Referring to the downing of an expensive US drone, which Bolton thinks deserved a harsh response, the author recalls: "A US MQ-9 Reaper drone had been shot down near Hodeida in Yemen, by a surface-to-air missile likely fired by the Houthis (an Islamic group) or Iranians from Houthi territory.....As it turned out, we did nothing, in large part because the military insisted we were uncertain who had actually shot the Reaper down. My assessment could not have been more to the contrary.....We were not trying criminal cases in court. We were in a messy real world where knowledge was always imperfect. Of course, that real world also includes bureaucrats expert at ensuring they don't do what they don't want to do, which was an especially powerful problem with a President whose views sometimes zigzagged hourly."

MQ-9 Reaper drone

⚫ Writing about the Administration's February, 2020 deal with the Taliban, which Bolton deplores, the author says: "I tweeted my opposition that morning, 'Signing the agreement with the Taliban is an unacceptable risk to America's civilian population. This is an Obama-style deal. Legitimizing the Taliban sends the wrong signal to ISIS and al Queda terrorists, and to America's enemies generally.'.....Time will prove who is right, and the full effects of the deal may not become apparent until after Trump leaves office. But there should be no mistaking this reality: Trump will be responsible for the consequences, politically and militarily."

 


 









Taliban negotiator Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar

⚫ Talking about the situation in Ukraine, Bolton notes: "Ukraine seems an unlikely place as a battleground to imperil an American presidency, but that is exactly what happened in 2019....Throughout my West Wing tenure, Trump wanted to do what he wanted to do, based on what he knew and what he saw as his own personal interests. And in Ukraine, he seemed finally able to have it all."

President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky

⚫ Speaking of Trump's tendency to placate dictators, Bolton says: "I wanted to brief Attorney General Barr on Trump's penchant to, in effect, give personal favors to dictators he liked, such as [downplaying] the criminal case of Halkbank (a Turkish bank charged with violating sanctions against Iran), ZTE (a Chinese phone company that engaged in criminal behavior), potentially Huawei (a Chinese company accused of stealing trade secrets), and who knew what else. Barr said he was very worried about the appearances Trump was creating."



Attorney General William Barr

⚫ Making excuses for not testifying during Trump's impeachment hearings, Bolton says: "From the very outset of proceedings in the House of Representatives, advocates for impeaching Trump on the Ukraine issue were committing impeachment malpractice. They seemed governed more by their own political imperatives to move swiftly to vote on articles of impeachment in order to avoid interfering with the Democratic nomination schedule than in completing a comprehensive investigation....[This] provided no opportunity to explore Trump's ham-handed involvement in other matters - criminal and civil, international and domestic - that should not properly be subject to manipulation by a President for personal reasons - political, economic, or any other." (Note: As much as I hate to admit it, Bolton makes a good point here. 🙂

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi announced impeachment hearings

⚫ Speaking of Trump's attempts to thwart publication of this book, Bolton observes: "Trump behaved typically, directing the seizure and withholding of my advisors' personal and other unclassified documents, despite numerous requests for their return; obstructing my Twitter account; and outright threats of censorship. His reaction thus ranged from the mean-spirited to the constitutionally impermissible. My reaction....my response? Game on.

President Trump tried to stop publication of Bolton's book

The book is 576 pages long, and covers Bolton's view of many additional topics, such as: Trump's obsession with making NATO countries - especially Germany - pony up more money; US attempts to help replace President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela; the US not bombing Iran to retaliate for destroyed drones (contrary to Bolton's advice); Trump's desire to get America out of Syria and Afghanistan; the overabundance of 'adults' in the foreign service, who value diplomacy over fighting (Bolton would rather fight); Trump's insistence that South Korea pay more for the US base there....and more.

Whether you're a fan of Bolton or not, the book is worth reading.

Rating: 4 stars