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<THREAD> It seems I got under John Bolton’s skin. My colleague @kinsgtonAReif alerted me to this with his tweet last week. https://twitter.com/KingstonAReif/status/1274889024004599812
My mother always hoped I would be a priest, but in am not, either actually or figuratively. But that tweet also caught the eyes of editors @washpost, who asked me to turn it into an oped. I did: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/theworldpost/wp/2019/02/01/inf/
In my article, which seems to be what triggered Bolton to cite me in his book, I document Bolton’s quest to blow up our nuclear security regime. He destroyed Nixon’s ABM Treaty, Reagan’s INF Treaty, Clinton’s Agreed Framework and Obama’s anti-nuclear Iran Agreement. 3/
Bolton is proud of it – proud of killing nuclear security treaties that were championed by Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals. In fact, he devotes an entire chapter of his book to it. Why? 4/
Bolton and his disciples reject any limits on American military power, even if applied to others equally. They want maximum flexibility, unlimited options for using military force as the lead instrument of US foreign policy, not a tool of last resort. Even Reagan’s INF treaty. 5/
This far right myth is dangerously wrong. That “piece of paper” broke the back of the nuclear arms race. That “piece of paper” destroyed 2,700 Soviet and US nuclear weapons. That “piece of paper” began a trend of massive nuclear reductions that lasted until Trump. 6/
Russia was violating the treaty. But there are always issues with implementing agreements. There are mechanisms for fixing them. When someone violates a law, you don’t repeal the law. For Bolton, problems with treaties he never supported are excuses for killing them now. 7/
Bolton doesn’t want to fix treaties. He wrote in 2014, “Violations give America the opportunity to discard obsolete, Cold War limits on its own arsenal and to upgrade its military capabilities.” This is what he’s done since he convinced W to abrogate the ABM treaty in 2001. 8/
America is safer when the nuclear-armed states agree to limits, to rules. These are the only weapons that can destroy in an afternoon all humanity has built over millennia. You want stability, predictability. You want to these weapons off the table. Agreements do that. 9/
We spent trillions on the Cold War arms race. Thanks to Bolton and Trump, we are doing it again. We are on track to spend $2 Trillion on new nuclear weapons. Is that what America needs now to be safe? Rather than sustained investments in education, health, infrastructure? 10/
This is a real choice. We can’t do both, especially not in a COVID world. We need social justice. Economic justice. Climate justice. Nuclear sanity.
It’s clear where Bolton comes down on this. The rest of us should have more wisdom. END https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/theworldpost/wp/2019/02/01/inf/
It’s clear where Bolton comes down on this. The rest of us should have more wisdom. END https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/theworldpost/wp/2019/02/01/inf/
