{"id":346334,"date":"2010-02-21T07:36:37","date_gmt":"2010-02-21T12:36:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thehollywoodliberal.com\/2010\/02\/21\/bolton-admits-that-things-could-go-wrong-after-military-strike-on-iran\/"},"modified":"2010-02-21T07:36:37","modified_gmt":"2010-02-21T12:36:37","slug":"bolton-admits-that-things-could-go-wrong-after-military-strike-on-iran","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/346334","title":{"rendered":"Bolton Admits That ?Things Could Go Wrong? After Military Strike On Iran"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bolton Admits That ?Things Could Go Wrong? After Military Strike On Iran \t\t<\/a>
Earlier this month, John Bolton claimed that \u201cIran simply has no intention of being talked out of its nuclear weapons program\u201d and that \u201cvery severe sanctions\u201d will not work. “There are two outcomes,” Bolton concluded, “one is Iran getting its nuclear weapons, the other is Israel or somebody uses military force to stop it.” Back […]<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, John Bolton claimed that \u201cIran simply has no intention of being talked out of its nuclear weapons program\u201d and that \u201cvery severe sanctions\u201d will not work. “There are two outcomes,” Bolton concluded, “one is Iran getting its nuclear weapons, the other is Israel or somebody uses military force to stop it<\/a>.” <\/p>\n

Back in December, Bolton argued that a simple “campaign of public diplomacy<\/a>” would prevent Iranian civilians from rallying around the regime after a military strike on the country’s nuclear facilities. Yesterday at CPAC, ThinkProgress asked Bolton if this strategy would work if civilians are killed in a military campaign against Iran’s nuclear program. “I don\u2019t accept that” civilians would be killed, Bolton replied. However, he later admitted that he’s unsure if civilians would die, but even then, his “campaign of public diplomacy” would still work: <\/p>\n

\n

TP: So if there is a military strike by us or the Israelis or whomever, you don\u2019t think there\u2019ll be any civilian casualties? <\/p>\n

BOLTON: I can\u2019t say that for sure. Things could go wrong<\/strong>. <\/p>\n

TP: That\u2019s what I\u2019m saying. If they do, would a public diplomacy campaign work? <\/p>\n

BOLTON: Yes! I think it would!<\/strong> I think it would. I think it has to be explained that this is, this will be an effort and that\u2019s the military regime\u2019s nuclear weapons program, not directed against the people of Iran at all. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Watch the interview: <\/p>\n

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Indeed, things could<\/em> go wrong. “[I]f you like Iraq and Afghanistan, you\u2019ll love Iran<\/a>,” retired Gen. Anthony Zinni has said about possible military action against Iran. ThinkProgress asked Bolton to respond to Zinni’s comment. “I don\u2019t think there\u2019s any prospect or any need for any kind of substantial ground forces by us or by Israel,” Bolton said. “I don\u2019t know what he means by that. I\u2019ve heard that comment and I just disagree with it.” <\/p>\n

A top defense official told ThinkProgress last year that an attack probably would \u201cincentivize the Iranians to go all the way to weaponize<\/a>\u201d their nuclear material and have \u201ca number of destabilizing\u201d consequences for the region. And, as the Wonk Room’s Matt Duss has noted, a strike on Iran would do much to “extinguish Iran\u2019s reform movement<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

Transcript: <\/span><\/p>\n

\n

TP: You said that in order for a military campaign to be successful on the American side that what we would need and all we would really need is to have a, accompany it with a public diplomacy campaign. <\/p>\n

BOLTON: That\u2019s not quite what I said. What I said was, if it were made clear, especially given the visible level of opposition to the government in Iran that the people have demonstrated, that if we could make it clear that the attack was directed only against the nuclear weapons program than I don\u2019t think it is at all likely that the popular reaction in Iran would be to rally around the government. I think they understand increasingly that this is an authoritarian government, it\u2019s a military dictatorship, even Secretary Clinton says that, and they don\u2019t want that. The people of Iran increasingly don\u2019t want that. <\/p>\n

TP: If civilians are killed in a military strike do you think a public diplomacy campaign would have any effect? <\/p>\n

BOLTON: Well I think we could take a lot of steps to avoid civilian casualties given the location of these plants, whose locations we know very precisely and I think that\u2019s something we do in the U.S. and I think the Israelis do as a matter of basic morality. <\/p>\n

TP: Right but I think it\u2019s an eventuality that you\u2019re going to have civilian casualties. Do you think\u2026<\/p>\n

BOLTON: I don\u2019t accept that and I think that it\u2019s important that we take every step possible to avoid that kind of outcome. And I think we\u2019ll be successful given where these plants are located, which we know; I think it\u2019s very possible to do that. <\/p>\n

TP: So if there is a military strike but us or the Israelis or whomever you don\u2019t think there\u2019ll be any civilian casualties? <\/p>\n

BOLTON: I can\u2019t say that for sure. Things could go wrong. <\/p>\n

TP: That\u2019s what I\u2019m saying. If they do, would a public diplomacy campaign work? <\/p>\n

BOLTON: Yes I think it would! I think it would. I think it has to be explained that this is, this will be an effort and that\u2019s the military regime\u2019s nuclear weapons program, not directed against the people of Iran at all. That happens to be the truth so it\u2019s always a good story to tell and I think we can make that story convincing. <\/p>\n

TP: So if the people who are against the regime after a military strike rise up against it, what does the West do in that situation? <\/p>\n

BOLTON: Well I think they\u2019re in a very difficult position. I\u2019m not sure they can accomplish regime change without more assistance from the outside. I think we should have been giving more outside assistance for 10 years <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bolton Admits That ?Things Could Go Wrong? After Military Strike On Iran Earlier this month, John Bolton claimed that \u201cIran simply has no intention of being talked out of its nuclear weapons program\u201d and that \u201cvery severe sanctions\u201d will not work. “There are two outcomes,” Bolton concluded, “one is Iran getting its nuclear weapons, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":807,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-346334","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346334","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/807"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=346334"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346334\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=346334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=346334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=346334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}