Bolton: “Well, there's getting out, and there's getting out. And that's been part of the irregularity of the decision-making process there. Everybody also says that we don't want to see another attack on the United States based on units that are in, terrorist activities that originate in Afghanistan. And under any version of a peace deal with the Taliban that's been seriously considered, an American presence is going to remain in Afghanistan to prevent that. So, when you say total withdrawal or withdrawal from Afghanistan, it's a little bit, you have to know exactly what the meaning is. I would argue that the best insurance for the United States against another terrorist attack is to keep a very strong forward presence in Afghanistan and other places. It's much better to have the capability to deal with the terrorists there than simply try and defend against attacks in the U.S.”
Van Susteren: “There are a lot of Americans that are really war weary, especially with Afghanistan and Iraq. Many thinking that it was one thing to go in for a short period of time back in 2001 after 9/11 and when the United States was attacked, but we've been in there now I mean, 18, 19 years. And, you know, was it a mistake just to go in beyond a short period time?”
Bolton: “Well, you know, we've been in Europe 75 years, are we war weary of being in Europe? The president apparently is, as he begins to withdraw forces from Germany. I think you have to evaluate on a continuous basis what the threats to the United States are and how best to deal with them. If that means keeping troops deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan for a long period of time, if that makes us and the innocent civilians here in America safer, then yes, I am in favor of it. Am I in favor of keeping troops based in Japan and South Korea for a long time to help stabilize Northeast Asia? Absolutely, if the alternative is a more unstable world where America's more threatened. We the United States live around the world. We're really the only country that is every place in the world to a significant extent. So, we have interests everywhere. We also have allies and potential allies everywhere. And I think the strengthening of America's alliances is something that does benefit international peace and security, and that in turn, that stability that we alone can help bring enhances American economic growth.”
Van Susteren: “Let me go to another continent, South America. Is it any of the U.S. business or should we be in the business of what's going on in Venezuela with Maduro?”
Bolton: “It is absolutely of concern to the United States. This threat of a totalitarian regime in the Western Hemisphere threatens all of us. And I said we had a troika of tyranny in a number of speeches, Ortega in Nicaragua, and the remaining Castro regime, let's call it what it is, in Cuba. But it's not just those regimes alone, it's the Russian influence in all three of those countries. It's the Chinese influence in Venezuela, the Iranian influence, the influence of countries outside the Western Hemisphere using weaknesses in countries, and in this part of the world to exploit their own interests and to threaten the United States. That to me is really what the Monroe Doctrine is about, is about keeping non-Western Hemisphere influences out.”
Van Susteren: “Well you bring Russia, but right now, Angela Merkel in Germany has a huge business deal with Russia. One of the things the President’s very upset about and has mentioned to her at different summits. You know, so a lot of these countries are dealing with each other who are our friends, like Germany, at the same time you know they're dealing with Russia, and you’ve got Russia and Venezuela.”
Bolton: “Right. Look, Ronald Reagan warned Margaret Thatcher very clearly, ‘Don't get involved in getting your oil and natural gas from Russia. Not Britain, not the rest of Europe.’ They chose not to follow his advice and this deal Nord Stream 2, the pipeline that's under construction that will come to Germany from Russia, I think is a huge mistake. I think that's the sort of thing...”
Van Susteren:“But isn't the President tough on Angela Merkel about that at the same time, saying, ‘Look, you know, we're going to bring U.S. troops out of Germany because it costs a lot of Americans money, and Germany has a lot of money, or has money,’ and at the same time you're not making your NATO commitment?”
Bolton: “Yeah, look, then you might ask Steve Mnuchin why we haven't imposed sanctions on the Russians for the Nord Stream pipeline.”
Van Susteren: “And the answer would be?”
Bolton: “The President didn't want to do that. So how tough was he really? Look, I think Germany is a key example of a country that's not met its obligations financially to NATO and yet is one of the principal beneficiaries of stability in Europe. Trump inherited a very serious problem from decades of American presidents that didn't do what they should do. So, any efforts to make them live up to their commitment and spend what they should spend are correct. But that's to strengthen the alliance, not to weaken it, not to end it.”
Van Susteren: “Your book talks about the present, and we've gone through all these countries but the book, I think your thesis in part is that the President’s unfit to be president. Fair, it that fair?”
Bolton: “That's one leg of it. The other leg of it is his lack of philosophy, to me demonstrates he's not a conservative Republican, he's not a liberal Democrat, he's just not anything. And I think that lack of grounding and the lack of mooring is especially troubling given the competence questions.”
Van Susteren: “Which is different though. It’s one thing to say you don't agree with it, another thing to say you think someone is dangerous for a job.”
Bolton: “Well, they’re two different things but they have a combined effect.”
Van Susteren: “Would you say that he should not be president because he's a threat to the country? Would you go that far?”
Bolton: “I think it's dangerous, yes. And I'm not gonna vote for him. I did vote for him in 2016, I'm not going to vote for Joe Biden, either because I don't agree with his policies. I'm going to write in a conservative Republican in Maryland where I live. I'm very unhappy about the election choices at the presidential level this November, very unhappy.”
Van Susteren: “Would you vote for, so I can understand, cause in your book, you're critical of a lot of peoples, if Secretary Pompeo were a candidate, would he be fit?”
Bolton: “I would not vote for him, no.”
Van Susteren: “Secretary Mnuchin?”
Bolton: “Well I don't think he's going to run, and, you know, if Joe Biden wins, he won't need a new Secretary of the Treasury.”
Van Susteren: “But would he be, I’m trying to figure out who you think is competent.”
Bolton: “Well, I think there are a lot of people out there in the Republican Party who could be President. I think Mike Pence could be. But this, for me, I think the country is going to have to have a discussion about where it wants to go once Trump's gone. And I think in the Republican Party, that conversation is especially important.”
Van Susteren: “Ambassador Nikki Haley is mentioned in your book, not favorably, and this suggests that she might run in 2024. Could you ever support her?”
Bolton: “Well, look, Mike Pompeo described Nikki Haley as light as a feather, which I repeat in the book. I put many of these anecdotes in because I think it's important for people to see how others react, and they'll draw their own conclusions from that. I've been criticized for a number of these things. You know, truth is always unhappy for some people, but the American voters don't have the advantage of sitting in and watching how decisions are made in the federal government. And so, I wrote in a book review of Secretary of Defense Bob Gates’ memoir in 2014, I thought Gates was right to publish, even though the Obama administration was still in office. I thought it was a service to the country. I'm just, just trying to follow that precedent.”
Van Susteren: “Why are so many people in the administration - even former press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, as well. They're coming at you pretty harshly, saying that you were disagreeable and not easy to get along with. That you weren’t a good person to work with. And so, how do you sort of defend that you're not just a malcontent writing a book?”
Bolton: “Well, I've been in every Republican administration since, since Nixon, with the exception of the Ford administration. I've worked for a lot of different people, have a lot of friends from all those administrations and still in this administration. And I think it's just a question of waiting until Donald Trump leaves the White House. And I think we'll hear a lot about what happened during his tenure.”
Van Susteren: “In terms of Ambassador Haley, that when she, when she resigned as ambassador, there was about a two month notice that she would be leaving, and she had this Oval Office meeting with the President. Is there a story behind that? Because I thought – I mean, I watched the press conference, or the conference between the two of them in the Oval Office and it seemed, it seemed unusual.”
Bolton: “Yeah, well, I recount a conversation I had with President Trump in the book about whether or not he should replace Vice President Mike Pence on the ticket in 2020. And it was common speculation in the West Wing that there were those who were advocating making Nikki Haley vice president. I thought that was a bad idea. I lay out in the book my explanation to the President. Certainly, I'm not taking credit for, for affecting his decision. He is going to keep the Vice President on the ticket, I think that's a positive thing. And ultimately, I think it became clear that's what was going to happen, and Nikki Haley said ‘Well, actually, I was never interested in being the vice-presidential nominee either.’ Look, whether Trump wins or loses in November, the Republican Party is going to nominate somebody else in 2024, and the 2024 race for the Republican nomination is already underway.”
Van Susteren: “Do you regret taking the job as national security adviser?”
Bolton: “No, no I don't. I don't. I don't look back retrospectively. You can't change anything anyway so why, why worry about it? I believed, perhaps incorrectly, that the reports about how Donald Trump behaved were inaccurate. I figured there must be a way to make this work. The United States faces a significant range of threats and challenges around the world. I thought I could help deal with those. I've spent a lot of my career in government service for the reason of trying to advance American national security interests. I thought it was worth the effort, and I thought writing the book to explain why I did it - if not helpful to me - would be helpful to many other Americans that want to know what exactly happens in the government.”
Van Susteren: “You know, in reading your book and reading his tweets and following all this, you know, he has rattled cages without any doubt. But I go back to that - I keep going back this this with you – what has he actually done that – you know, whether I agree with it or not - that puts the United States in a lesser position? That’s what I’m trying to focus on.”
Bolton: “Well, I've given you a range of specifics where I think he's made mistakes. I think you also have to look at what the economists call opportunity cost, the missed opportunities that he didn't take advantage of. And I think there are a range of those, particularly dealing with Russia and China. The most recent example of missed opportunities is dealing effectively with the coronavirus, which came out of China. The Chinese covered it up, they lied about the effect inside China. They wouldn't give access to people who could have understood the disease more. And in January and February, when people were sounding the warning about the potential consequences of a pandemic, Trump just didn't want to hear about it, didn't want to hear anything bad about China, and he didn't want to hear anything that might affect the U.S. economy.”
Van Susteren: “And I have to bring up Ukraine, because that's obviously, I haven’t gotten to Ukraine, is that you were there through the bulk of the Ukraine discussion. Can you recount for me, you know, what was Giuliani's job? The president's lawyer, what, what was he supposed to be doing?”
Bolton: “I don't know the full extent of what Rudy was doing because he wasn't part of the government …”
Van Susteren: “So, he’s like a satellite for the President?”
Bolton: “It's like an alternative, off the shelf foreign policy that none of us in the government really fully understood. But I think what emerged over a period of time - it didn't come in some blinding revelation - but what emerged over a period of time was that the focus on the Ukraine had everything to do with damaging Trump's political opponents, both Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. It had nothing to do with the issue of corruption in the Ukraine. It was …”
Van Susteren: “So you, so you totally dismiss that there was – that the President had any issue in trying to stop corruption in Ukraine?”
Bolton: “Look, there are reasons and there are pretexts. The Ukraine corruption mantra was a pretext. The real issue was the President's re-election.”
Van Susteren: “And was, was - and Giuliani was communicating with the President? I mean, presumably about this, sort of, outside, sort of, the White House?”
Bolton: “I don't know how often he communicated with him, but my impression was frequently. Sometimes I was brought into those communications and that's how I learned over a period of time, as I described in the book, how this was, how this was playing out.”
Van Susteren: “You know, it's - the money for Ukraine had to be delivered by the end of the fiscal year, which was September 30. That ultimately happened. Right?”
Bolton: “Right.”
Van Susteren: “Why did that happen? If the President was trying to leverage that money to get a political advantage, why do you think that he finally did release the money?”
Bolton: “Because I think there was a case where on a bipartisan basis, members of Congress were saying, ‘What's going on here? We authorized this money. You signed the legislation that does that. And everybody believes it's in American national security interest to provide that security assistance. And you need to do it.’ Within the White House, there was only one person who ever had doubts about sending that assistance to the Ukraine, and it was Donald Trump. And I think finally, just the force, the political pressure, required him to do it.”
Van Susteren: “I assume you know Rudy Giuliani prior to your job.”
Bolton: “I’ve known him for a long time.”
Van Susteren: “Everybody’s known him – and for the life of me, I can’t figure out – and I’ve interviewed him many times. I can't figure out what his job or role was in this Ukraine thing, because he didn't work in the White House.”
Bolton: “Well, I don't myself know everything that he was doing. My guess is only he and Donald Trump knew everything he was doing. And I consider that another danger, when people are acting on behalf of a President for political purposes but seeming to act on behalf of the country. And there is a clear divergence between the President's political interest and the national interest.”
Van Susteren: “But the interesting thing is, as unusual as that whole thing was, and I use word unusual lightly, is that ultimately Ukraine got the money. It was one of those situations where it looks like a very, it looks very unusual from, you know from my perspective, what was going on, things that I have since learned. Yet in the end, the money was given to Ukraine.”
Bolton: “But that was just the issue at the moment. The more strategic effect is that it's hopelessly complicated U.S.-Ukrainian bilateral relations, number one. And number two, it gave Russia any number of opportunities to continue to cause mischief inside Ukraine. Because the attention of the Ukrainian, and American, and much of Western European leadership was devoted to solving the Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton problem there. That's the kind of missed opportunity that is very hard to calculate, but it's no less real.”
Van Susteren: “One last question. Vladimir Putin. What’s the President’s relationship with Vladimir Putin?”
Bolton: “Well, I think Putin thinks he can play Trump like a fiddle. I think he thinks...”
Van Susteren: “Has he?”
Bolton: “He sees right through him. Well, I think he has made it almost impossible for Donald
Trump to admit that the Russians interfered in the 2016 election, tried to interfere in the 2018 election, and undoubtedly are going to try and interfere in the 2020 election. Because Trump believes if he acknowledges that, he's undercutting the legitimacy of his victory in 2016. I happen to think that's wrong. But as the Helsinki Summit press conference demonstrated when it appeared the President took the word of Vladimir Putin over his own intelligence agencies, this has just caused enormous concern, especially among our allies. And I just have to believe - I can watch Putin across the table, and I just think he thinks he's got exactly what he wants on the opposite side when he sits across from Trump.”
Van Susteren: “I've been to North Korea three times, never met Kim Jong Un, would like to. What was your impression of him?”
Bolton: “This is a man who is in control, felt very sure about being in control, and thought clearly he could get the kind of deal he wanted from Donald Trump. A partial concession on the nuclear program in exchange for significant economic benefits that would give him an economic lifeline and allow him to continue the nuclear program. He thought he could get that deal. They had gotten it from other American presidents. It didn't happen this time.”
Van Susteren: “Is he smart?”
Bolton: “I think he's smart in a very limited way. I mean, if you live in that bubble in North Korea, you're living in a bunker mentality. He has lived in the West, he does have other experiences, there's no doubt about that. He certainly sees more than almost anybody else in his country. But this is a - this is the strangest regime in the world. Think about it. It's a hereditary communist dictatorship. So that is not a normal country.”
Van Susteren: “Ambassador, thank you sir.”
Bolton: “Thank you.
Van Susteren: “There are a lot of Americans that are really war weary, especially with Afghanistan and Iraq. Many thinking that it was one thing to go in for a short period of time back in 2001 after 9/11 and when the United States was attacked, but we've been in there now I mean, 18, 19 years. And, you know, was it a mistake just to go in beyond a short period time?”
Bolton: “Well, you know, we've been in Europe 75 years, are we war weary of being in Europe? The president apparently is, as he begins to withdraw forces from Germany. I think you have to evaluate on a continuous basis what the threats to the United States are and how best to deal with them. If that means keeping troops deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan for a long period of time, if that makes us and the innocent civilians here in America safer, then yes, I am in favor of it. Am I in favor of keeping troops based in Japan and South Korea for a long time to help stabilize Northeast Asia? Absolutely, if the alternative is a more unstable world where America's more threatened. We the United States live around the world. We're really the only country that is every place in the world to a significant extent. So, we have interests everywhere. We also have allies and potential allies everywhere. And I think the strengthening of America's alliances is something that does benefit international peace and security, and that in turn, that stability that we alone can help bring enhances American economic growth.”
Van Susteren: “Let me go to another continent, South America. Is it any of the U.S. business or should we be in the business of what's going on in Venezuela with Maduro?”
Bolton: “It is absolutely of concern to the United States. This threat of a totalitarian regime in the Western Hemisphere threatens all of us. And I said we had a troika of tyranny in a number of speeches, Ortega in Nicaragua, and the remaining Castro regime, let's call it what it is, in Cuba. But it's not just those regimes alone, it's the Russian influence in all three of those countries. It's the Chinese influence in Venezuela, the Iranian influence, the influence of countries outside the Western Hemisphere using weaknesses in countries, and in this part of the world to exploit their own interests and to threaten the United States. That to me is really what the Monroe Doctrine is about, is about keeping non-Western Hemisphere influences out.”
Van Susteren: “Well you bring Russia, but right now, Angela Merkel in Germany has a huge business deal with Russia. One of the things the President’s very upset about and has mentioned to her at different summits. You know, so a lot of these countries are dealing with each other who are our friends, like Germany, at the same time you know they're dealing with Russia, and you’ve got Russia and Venezuela.”
Bolton: “Right. Look, Ronald Reagan warned Margaret Thatcher very clearly, ‘Don't get involved in getting your oil and natural gas from Russia. Not Britain, not the rest of Europe.’ They chose not to follow his advice and this deal Nord Stream 2, the pipeline that's under construction that will come to Germany from Russia, I think is a huge mistake. I think that's the sort of thing...”
Van Susteren:“But isn't the President tough on Angela Merkel about that at the same time, saying, ‘Look, you know, we're going to bring U.S. troops out of Germany because it costs a lot of Americans money, and Germany has a lot of money, or has money,’ and at the same time you're not making your NATO commitment?”
Bolton: “Yeah, look, then you might ask Steve Mnuchin why we haven't imposed sanctions on the Russians for the Nord Stream pipeline.”
Van Susteren: “And the answer would be?”
Bolton: “The President didn't want to do that. So how tough was he really? Look, I think Germany is a key example of a country that's not met its obligations financially to NATO and yet is one of the principal beneficiaries of stability in Europe. Trump inherited a very serious problem from decades of American presidents that didn't do what they should do. So, any efforts to make them live up to their commitment and spend what they should spend are correct. But that's to strengthen the alliance, not to weaken it, not to end it.”
Van Susteren: “Your book talks about the present, and we've gone through all these countries but the book, I think your thesis in part is that the President’s unfit to be president. Fair, it that fair?”
Bolton: “That's one leg of it. The other leg of it is his lack of philosophy, to me demonstrates he's not a conservative Republican, he's not a liberal Democrat, he's just not anything. And I think that lack of grounding and the lack of mooring is especially troubling given the competence questions.”
Van Susteren: “Which is different though. It’s one thing to say you don't agree with it, another thing to say you think someone is dangerous for a job.”
Bolton: “Well, they’re two different things but they have a combined effect.”
Van Susteren: “Would you say that he should not be president because he's a threat to the country? Would you go that far?”
Bolton: “I think it's dangerous, yes. And I'm not gonna vote for him. I did vote for him in 2016, I'm not going to vote for Joe Biden, either because I don't agree with his policies. I'm going to write in a conservative Republican in Maryland where I live. I'm very unhappy about the election choices at the presidential level this November, very unhappy.”
Van Susteren: “Would you vote for, so I can understand, cause in your book, you're critical of a lot of peoples, if Secretary Pompeo were a candidate, would he be fit?”
Bolton: “I would not vote for him, no.”
Van Susteren: “Secretary Mnuchin?”
Bolton: “Well I don't think he's going to run, and, you know, if Joe Biden wins, he won't need a new Secretary of the Treasury.”
Van Susteren: “But would he be, I’m trying to figure out who you think is competent.”
Bolton: “Well, I think there are a lot of people out there in the Republican Party who could be President. I think Mike Pence could be. But this, for me, I think the country is going to have to have a discussion about where it wants to go once Trump's gone. And I think in the Republican Party, that conversation is especially important.”
Van Susteren: “Ambassador Nikki Haley is mentioned in your book, not favorably, and this suggests that she might run in 2024. Could you ever support her?”
Bolton: “Well, look, Mike Pompeo described Nikki Haley as light as a feather, which I repeat in the book. I put many of these anecdotes in because I think it's important for people to see how others react, and they'll draw their own conclusions from that. I've been criticized for a number of these things. You know, truth is always unhappy for some people, but the American voters don't have the advantage of sitting in and watching how decisions are made in the federal government. And so, I wrote in a book review of Secretary of Defense Bob Gates’ memoir in 2014, I thought Gates was right to publish, even though the Obama administration was still in office. I thought it was a service to the country. I'm just, just trying to follow that precedent.”
Van Susteren: “Why are so many people in the administration - even former press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, as well. They're coming at you pretty harshly, saying that you were disagreeable and not easy to get along with. That you weren’t a good person to work with. And so, how do you sort of defend that you're not just a malcontent writing a book?”
Bolton: “Well, I've been in every Republican administration since, since Nixon, with the exception of the Ford administration. I've worked for a lot of different people, have a lot of friends from all those administrations and still in this administration. And I think it's just a question of waiting until Donald Trump leaves the White House. And I think we'll hear a lot about what happened during his tenure.”
Van Susteren: “In terms of Ambassador Haley, that when she, when she resigned as ambassador, there was about a two month notice that she would be leaving, and she had this Oval Office meeting with the President. Is there a story behind that? Because I thought – I mean, I watched the press conference, or the conference between the two of them in the Oval Office and it seemed, it seemed unusual.”
Bolton: “Yeah, well, I recount a conversation I had with President Trump in the book about whether or not he should replace Vice President Mike Pence on the ticket in 2020. And it was common speculation in the West Wing that there were those who were advocating making Nikki Haley vice president. I thought that was a bad idea. I lay out in the book my explanation to the President. Certainly, I'm not taking credit for, for affecting his decision. He is going to keep the Vice President on the ticket, I think that's a positive thing. And ultimately, I think it became clear that's what was going to happen, and Nikki Haley said ‘Well, actually, I was never interested in being the vice-presidential nominee either.’ Look, whether Trump wins or loses in November, the Republican Party is going to nominate somebody else in 2024, and the 2024 race for the Republican nomination is already underway.”
Van Susteren: “Do you regret taking the job as national security adviser?”
Bolton: “No, no I don't. I don't. I don't look back retrospectively. You can't change anything anyway so why, why worry about it? I believed, perhaps incorrectly, that the reports about how Donald Trump behaved were inaccurate. I figured there must be a way to make this work. The United States faces a significant range of threats and challenges around the world. I thought I could help deal with those. I've spent a lot of my career in government service for the reason of trying to advance American national security interests. I thought it was worth the effort, and I thought writing the book to explain why I did it - if not helpful to me - would be helpful to many other Americans that want to know what exactly happens in the government.”
Van Susteren: “You know, in reading your book and reading his tweets and following all this, you know, he has rattled cages without any doubt. But I go back to that - I keep going back this this with you – what has he actually done that – you know, whether I agree with it or not - that puts the United States in a lesser position? That’s what I’m trying to focus on.”
Bolton: “Well, I've given you a range of specifics where I think he's made mistakes. I think you also have to look at what the economists call opportunity cost, the missed opportunities that he didn't take advantage of. And I think there are a range of those, particularly dealing with Russia and China. The most recent example of missed opportunities is dealing effectively with the coronavirus, which came out of China. The Chinese covered it up, they lied about the effect inside China. They wouldn't give access to people who could have understood the disease more. And in January and February, when people were sounding the warning about the potential consequences of a pandemic, Trump just didn't want to hear about it, didn't want to hear anything bad about China, and he didn't want to hear anything that might affect the U.S. economy.”
Van Susteren: “And I have to bring up Ukraine, because that's obviously, I haven’t gotten to Ukraine, is that you were there through the bulk of the Ukraine discussion. Can you recount for me, you know, what was Giuliani's job? The president's lawyer, what, what was he supposed to be doing?”
Bolton: “I don't know the full extent of what Rudy was doing because he wasn't part of the government …”
Van Susteren: “So, he’s like a satellite for the President?”
Bolton: “It's like an alternative, off the shelf foreign policy that none of us in the government really fully understood. But I think what emerged over a period of time - it didn't come in some blinding revelation - but what emerged over a period of time was that the focus on the Ukraine had everything to do with damaging Trump's political opponents, both Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. It had nothing to do with the issue of corruption in the Ukraine. It was …”
Van Susteren: “So you, so you totally dismiss that there was – that the President had any issue in trying to stop corruption in Ukraine?”
Bolton: “Look, there are reasons and there are pretexts. The Ukraine corruption mantra was a pretext. The real issue was the President's re-election.”
Van Susteren: “And was, was - and Giuliani was communicating with the President? I mean, presumably about this, sort of, outside, sort of, the White House?”
Bolton: “I don't know how often he communicated with him, but my impression was frequently. Sometimes I was brought into those communications and that's how I learned over a period of time, as I described in the book, how this was, how this was playing out.”
Van Susteren: “You know, it's - the money for Ukraine had to be delivered by the end of the fiscal year, which was September 30. That ultimately happened. Right?”
Bolton: “Right.”
Van Susteren: “Why did that happen? If the President was trying to leverage that money to get a political advantage, why do you think that he finally did release the money?”
Bolton: “Because I think there was a case where on a bipartisan basis, members of Congress were saying, ‘What's going on here? We authorized this money. You signed the legislation that does that. And everybody believes it's in American national security interest to provide that security assistance. And you need to do it.’ Within the White House, there was only one person who ever had doubts about sending that assistance to the Ukraine, and it was Donald Trump. And I think finally, just the force, the political pressure, required him to do it.”
Van Susteren: “I assume you know Rudy Giuliani prior to your job.”
Bolton: “I’ve known him for a long time.”
Van Susteren: “Everybody’s known him – and for the life of me, I can’t figure out – and I’ve interviewed him many times. I can't figure out what his job or role was in this Ukraine thing, because he didn't work in the White House.”
Bolton: “Well, I don't myself know everything that he was doing. My guess is only he and Donald Trump knew everything he was doing. And I consider that another danger, when people are acting on behalf of a President for political purposes but seeming to act on behalf of the country. And there is a clear divergence between the President's political interest and the national interest.”
Van Susteren: “But the interesting thing is, as unusual as that whole thing was, and I use word unusual lightly, is that ultimately Ukraine got the money. It was one of those situations where it looks like a very, it looks very unusual from, you know from my perspective, what was going on, things that I have since learned. Yet in the end, the money was given to Ukraine.”
Bolton: “But that was just the issue at the moment. The more strategic effect is that it's hopelessly complicated U.S.-Ukrainian bilateral relations, number one. And number two, it gave Russia any number of opportunities to continue to cause mischief inside Ukraine. Because the attention of the Ukrainian, and American, and much of Western European leadership was devoted to solving the Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton problem there. That's the kind of missed opportunity that is very hard to calculate, but it's no less real.”
Van Susteren: “One last question. Vladimir Putin. What’s the President’s relationship with Vladimir Putin?”
Bolton: “Well, I think Putin thinks he can play Trump like a fiddle. I think he thinks...”
Van Susteren: “Has he?”
Bolton: “He sees right through him. Well, I think he has made it almost impossible for Donald
Trump to admit that the Russians interfered in the 2016 election, tried to interfere in the 2018 election, and undoubtedly are going to try and interfere in the 2020 election. Because Trump believes if he acknowledges that, he's undercutting the legitimacy of his victory in 2016. I happen to think that's wrong. But as the Helsinki Summit press conference demonstrated when it appeared the President took the word of Vladimir Putin over his own intelligence agencies, this has just caused enormous concern, especially among our allies. And I just have to believe - I can watch Putin across the table, and I just think he thinks he's got exactly what he wants on the opposite side when he sits across from Trump.”
Van Susteren: “I've been to North Korea three times, never met Kim Jong Un, would like to. What was your impression of him?”
Bolton: “This is a man who is in control, felt very sure about being in control, and thought clearly he could get the kind of deal he wanted from Donald Trump. A partial concession on the nuclear program in exchange for significant economic benefits that would give him an economic lifeline and allow him to continue the nuclear program. He thought he could get that deal. They had gotten it from other American presidents. It didn't happen this time.”
Van Susteren: “Is he smart?”
Bolton: “I think he's smart in a very limited way. I mean, if you live in that bubble in North Korea, you're living in a bunker mentality. He has lived in the West, he does have other experiences, there's no doubt about that. He certainly sees more than almost anybody else in his country. But this is a - this is the strangest regime in the world. Think about it. It's a hereditary communist dictatorship. So that is not a normal country.”
Van Susteren: “Ambassador, thank you sir.”
Bolton: “Thank you.
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