The Sky is Falling — on John Bolton

John Bolton has made a cottage industry out of trying to scare people about nuclear weapons. Contrary to the subtitle of Dr. Strangelove – “how I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb” – Bolton’s motto seems to be “why you need to start worrying and embrace the bomb.” He reiterates this point at every opportunity, most recently in a piece published in the Washington Examiner. But does he really believe that the Obama administration’s modest but essential first steps towards reducing global nuclear arsenals are putting us in grave danger? I seriously doubt it.

Bolton believes in maintaining the status quo, a world in which the United States and Russia possess 95% of the world’s arsenal of 20,000-plus nuclear weapons and it’s not worth even trying to use diplomacy to reduce those arsenals, much less those of other nuclear powers. In his most recent piece, he even appears to dismiss President Obama’s pledge to secure “all vulnerable nuclear materials in four years, so that they never fall into the hands of terrorists.” What’s Bolton’s logic here? Do we need to leave loose nukes and unsecured bomb-making materials lying around to show we’re tough? Or is he just so intent on opposing anything that the Obama administration is for that he will oppose even the most effective policies available for reducing the nuclear danger?

What are Bolton’s alternatives to diplomacy? Bombing Iran? He has implied as much, even though the effects of such an action would most likely be to undermine the Iranian opposition, accelerate Tehran’s efforts to seek a nuclear weapon, and sow further chaos in a region that can ill afford it. Invading North Korea? Even he doesn’t seem willing to go that far over the top.

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