John Bolton Suggests Nuclear Attack On Iran

The Faster Times ^ | October 14, 2009 | By Daniel Luban

[Strategy]

This Friday, the American Enterprise Institute will host an event addressing the question "Should Israel attack Iran?" The event includes, among others, Iran uberhawk Michael Rubin and infamous "torture lawyer" John Yoo, but the real star is likely to be John Bolton, the former U.N. ambassador whose right-of-Attila views left him an outcast even within the second Bush administration.

[Rummyfan]

...but the real star is likely to be John Bolton, the former U.N. ambassador whose right-of-Attila views left him an outcast even within the second Bush administration.

That's some character assassination there! I seem to remember that it was the Senate which would not confirm John Bolton's appointment when his recess term expired.

[Pistolshot]

right-of-Attila views left him an outcast even within the second Bush administration.

Stopped reading right there.

[C210N]

John Bolton is Centrist/main-stream thinking. Everybody else is leftist.

just doing what the left does...

[myknowledge]

No nuclear war. Period.

John Bolton is itching for WWIII.

[nuconvert]

I’d have to read or hear Bolton’s whole speech, not excerpts made by a young Lib.

[WorkerbeeCitizen]

Tell that to Ahmanutjob in Iran will ya.

[KarlInOhio]

right-of-Attila views left him an outcast even within the second Bush administration.

I have never understood why Attila the Hun is seen as the prototype right winger. He we the chief of a barbarian tribe that sacked Rome. That doesn't really fall anywhere on the modern left-right spectrum (although if you look at what Dems do to cities, you might assume that someone who sacks major cities in on the left). Even going back to the original defininition of right and left of being monarchist/anti-monarchist in prerevolutionary France doesn't map well onto modern American politics.

[andy58-in-nh]

When you are out of ideas, all that is left is "character assassination" (i.e. - ad hominem attacks). Judging from what we have heard during the last few days, the Left has exhausted its ideas.

[WalterSkinner]

..John Bolton is my kind of guy--not timid about using the "N" word when it comes to military options

Right after 9/11, Wolfowitz was talking the same way. For a minute, the world was really afraid of us--that's not a bad thing in these dangerous times...

[Williams]

Attila never sacked Rome. Never entered the city. Turned back once when he could have as the result of superstition and bribes, was defeated far from Rome the second time by a Roman/German confederation at the battle of Chalon, died in his wedding bed with a young girl before he could launch the third invasion.

[Zeppo]

Is there any cliche or leftardism that is too idiotic for Daniel Luban to use?

[listenhillary]

John might wear it with honor. You know that you’re driving them insane when they use this phrase to describe you.

[Williams]

However, your basic characterization is correct. Attila not only sacked but leveled and destroyed any city that resisted him. They said not so much as a blade of grass ever grew again on a spot where Atilla’s horse had trodden.

[Lazamataz]

Atilla the Hun turned out to be a wonderful, benevolent leader who raised the standards of living for his population, defended his country well, secured new resources, and established a democratic republic.

So I fail to see how comparison to Atilla the Hun is a slur.

[Merlinator]

Palin/Bolton 2012 wouldn’t that be a kick a$$ team!

[reagan_fanatic]

John Bolton, the former U.N. ambassador whose right-of-Attila views

Yup - no bias there.


/sarc

[IndyTiger]

IMO, we should have done a tactical nuke strike on the Taliban camps right after 9/11. Think what the Romans did to Carthage after the Third Punic War (146 BC). The Romans killed all the men, sold the women and children into slavery, and burned every building in the city to a crisp. We should have done the 21st century equivalent to our enemies after 9/11.

[chuck_the_tv_out]

"right-of-Attila"

Bull. Bolton is a genuine moderate.

But the media and DC establishment are so extremely liberal he stands out.

What's your idea of liberal? Chris "stick a CO2 can in Rush Limbaugh's head" Matthews?

We ARE the moderates. The moderates are liberals, the liberals are leftists, the leftists are marxist/communist.

[Unassuaged]

Leveling cities so flat that “the horses of his horde would not need to break gallup” was Genghis Khan, a few centuries later, right?

[ScottinVA]

“Palin/Bolton 2012 wouldn’t that be a kick a$$ team!”

Absolutely! Or Bachmann/Bolton.

[Squantos]

Dozen B61 Mod 11’s from the Show me State’s stealthy birds delivered per “Satan’s Needle” style, three deep at each of the four suspect sites should Qum em down deep ! Cover their exit with F-22’s creating havoc and chaos in country as fighters surge towards their borders from Iraq, Afghanistan, UAE and the Gulf as a false flag and turn out when the F-22’s egress.

Just how I would do it if I had the keys for a day and was sure of my intel and targets.......

World hates us already, they may as well respect us.

My opinion.

[Thermalseeker]

When you are out of ideas, all that is left is "character assassination"

Bingo. It's either that, or triangulation to distract your opponents....

[SolidWood]

He is suggesting nuclear-enhanced bunker busters to get to the facilities. The author (and the nuts) insinuate that he means “normal” WMD nukes. Someone who suggests the use of the latter as a preemptive weapon is certifiably nuts.

[Scythian]

Do I need to start popping my radiation pills?

[pburgh01]

The Romans I agree had a strategy for conquest and subjugation which worked for 1000 years. They cared a whit for other cultures or their customs it was their way or the highway, when they did like Judea they paid handsomely for it. I hear alot of the same arguments with Afghanistan that all the experts said about the Japanese in 1940. “Never been defeated, never been conquered, been tried...blah, blah”. Fact is Afghanistan without US support and arms would have been a Soviet Republic in 1 year, the mythos around the Mujahdeen is just that a mythos. Muslim battlefield prowess when not having overwhelming numbers is pretty piss poor.

[kabar]

Negotiations have failed, and so too have sanctions," Bolton said, echoing his previously-stated belief that sanctions will prove ineffectual in changing Tehran’s behavior. "So we’re at a very unhappy point — a very unhappy point — where unless Israel is prepared to use nuclear weapons against Iran’s program , Iran will have nuclear weapons in the very near future." Bolton made clear that the latter option is unacceptable.

Did you read the article? Where do you come up with the conclusion that "John Bolton is itching for WWIII?" The fact that you readily believe this left-wing screed reflects more on you than Bolton or the author.

[garyhope]

Do we have “nuclear-enhanced bunker busters” ?

What are they? What are some of the specifics of them. I’d like to know. Thanks.

[rahbert]

Code Pink would be outrayyged.

[Ev Reeman]

http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/bolton_obama_israel_un/2009/09/23/263709.html?s=al&promo_code=8A39-1

[Squantos]

Hopefully they have already deployed as inhuman shields !

A two’fer !

[Ev Reeman]

http://www.newsmax.com/koch/obama_missile_russia/2009/09/22/263198.html

[Ev Reeman]

http://video.newsmax.com/Manage/Videos/VideoGallery/Bolton—Obama-s-U-N—Speech—Unpresidential-?s=al&promo_code=8A39-1

[listenhillary]

Re: your response to the WWIII poster.

Arm chair military strategists spouting off on FR? That’s never happened before, has it?

[Abathar]

"The B61 is a variable yield, kiloton-range weapon called "Full Fuzing Option"(FUFO) or "Dial-a-yield" by many service personnel. Tactical versions (Mods 3, 4, and 10) can be set to 0.3, 1.5, 5, 10, 60, 80, or 170 kiloton explosive yield (depending on version). The strategic version (B61 Mod 7) has four yield options, with a maximum of 340 kilotons. Sources conflict on the yield of the earth-penetrating Mod 11; the physics package or bomb core components of the Mod 11 are apparently unchanged from the earlier strategic Mod 7, however the declassified 2001 Nuclear Posture Review [2] states that the B-61-11 has only a single yield; some sources indicate 10 KT, others suggest the 340 kiloton maximum yield as the Mod-7."

Yep, just don't know what yield they are.

[myknowledge]

Or here’s another conclusion:

Preemptive air strikes on Iranian nuke facilities.

That would not just be our universal conclusion, but also John Bolton’s conclusion.

[Dick Bachert]

Bolton is correct. The world can take them out now or wait until the fools on the hill see something like this:

(With any luck, they'll be in session when it happens.)

[pennboricua]

I fail to understand why a nuclear bomb strike is the only option against Iran.,tactical or otherwise.
Remember reading of various weapons, some that would cause death of population but would retain infrastructure, others that would demolish bunkers buried up to 200 feet, and still the more efficient EMP bomb that would destroy the technology of a country.
I believe that when the time comes it will be an EMP detonation over Iran that will cripple the Mad Mullahs and the Nutjob in Iran.

[dennisw]

I have noting against using tactical nuke bunker busters on Iranian nuclear facilities...all of them

Only problem is Iran’s next step would be to buy a nuke and get it into the USA somehow.....Or how about detonating a nuke smuggled on a container vessel in NY harbor or Los Angels harbor

[kabar]

Or regime change. Obama dropped the ball on taking advantage of the election riots. The mullahs have major domestic problems including a faltering economy. They are also suffering a a major brain drain among the young. The regime is vulnerable, which is why they are seeking to create an external threat, to divert attention from the domestic issues and to unite the people behind the regime.

Although written over three years ago, here is the best analysis of the situation I have read: Edward N. Luttwak: "Three reasons not to bomb Iran - yet"

We need to covertly and overtly aid the opposition to the regime within and outside the country.

[Captain Kirk]

Well said. These folks here who want perpetual war everywhere, all the time, never explain who they intend to pay for it. We’ve already got a debt of trillions. What do they intend to do? Print some more?

[OB1kNOb]

HUNTER/BOLTON 2012 !

[Ev Reeman]

Bunker busters may do the trick as well.

[RasterMaster]

Keep your head buried in the sand....the enemy is just itching to lob one over DC and will do so the moment they obtain the capability.

[myknowledge]

The Iranians could only have done that to Washington D.C. with a warhead delivered by a Shahab-6 (an Iranian reverse-engineered Taepodong-2 ICBM).

[Quickgun]

Don’t know about Bolton, but Attila, my kind of guy!

[RaceBannon]

I’d love to tell hiim, face to face

[itsahoot]

John Bolton is itching for WWIII.

John Bolton actually has a brain, you either accept reality or you don't. we are at war whether we believe it or not. Iran officially declared war on the United States when they bombed the Kobar Towers.

We never took that declaration seriously, if we don't deal with it soon, you will have that Nuclear war you don't want, right here at home.

Assuming you actually live in the United States.

[GraceG]

>> IMO, we should have done a tactical nuke strike on the Taliban camps right after 9/11. Think what the Romans did to Carthage after the Third Punic War (146 BC). The Romans killed all the men, sold the women and children into slavery, and burned every building in the city to a crisp. We should have done the 21st century equivalent to our enemies after 9/11. <<

Remove every male over the age of 14 within 50 kilometers of any terrorist training camp in Afghanistan.

That would have been a similar response.

[4woodenboats]

The title is misleading, and the author’s moral turpitude lends his shrine to banality all the relevance and charm of a leaky boil, thrice squeezed.