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Ambassador John Bolton is a regular guest on television, radio, and writes columns for major media publications. Check back here daily to for commentary and analysis of breaking news and current events from John Bolton.

Trump Arms Ukraine But Still Wants Out

July 22, 2025

He’s sending Kyiv Patriot air defenses, but he’s building himself an off-ramp President Trump’s decision to send more Patriot air-defenses to Ukraine was the right call. Supporters of Kyiv’s struggle against Moscow hope this signals renewed commitment from the White House to back Ukraine with U.S. military assistance. Maybe....


How the West Can Ensure Iran Never Gets the Bomb

July 9, 2025

At the June Group of Seven meeting in Canada, Germany’s chancellor, Friedrich Merz, answered a reporter’s question about Israel’s attacks on Iran that were then taking place: “This is the dirty work that Israel is doing for all of us.” He added to the German journalist, “We are also...


Trump and Netanyahu are heading for an Oval Office showdown

July 5, 2025

Bibi Netanyahu’s Oval Office meeting with Donald Trump on Monday could be a game-changer. They will undoubtedly focus on Iran, Gaza, and Syria’s new regime among other subjects. But how close are the two leaders’ positions, and can their differences be reconciled? Both will declare the meeting “successful,” but...


Trump’s Work in Iran Has Only Begun

July 3, 2025

Satisfaction and frustration most accurately capture what should be America’s reaction to last month’s Israeli-U.S. military strikes on Iran. Satisfaction because the raids, particularly against the nuclear-weapons program, may have achieved what decades of illusion, naïveté, misguided diplomacy and inadequate economic sanctions failed to achieve, and frustration because the...


Iran’s Ayatollahs Are Weaker Than Ever

June 16, 2025

Iran’s war against Israel took another turn for the worse last week as Operation Rising Lion struck Tehran’s nuclear-weapons program, air defenses and military leadership. Iran’s retaliation has so far been uneven and ineffective. Contrary to the scaremongers, World War III hasn’t broken out, nor will it. But what...


Will Trump TACO on Iran?

June 11, 2025

The world is undeniably close to learning whether Iran can yet again out-negotiate and out-last feckless Western politicians and save its nuclear-weapons program.  On June 5, Donald Trump said(https://www.axios.com/2025/06/04/iran-nuclear-deal-trump) Iran was “slow-walking” nuclear negotiations with the United States.  His two-month time limit to the Ayatollah Khamenei has either expired...


Why Trump stopped listening to Netanyahu

June 6, 2025

Donald Trump was widely seen in his first term as a knee-jerk defender of Israel.  Not so now.  Whether and how far Washington splits from Jerusalem, especially on Iran’s nuclear-weapons program, has enormous security implications for America, Israel, and the wider Middle East. For Trump, personal relationships with foreign...


What is required of Sharia to obtain full American recognition

May 26, 2025

Donald Trump’s just-concluded Middle East visit produced considerable press coverage for the business deals and investments he and his counterparts announced.  The visit’s biggest news, however, was his declaration that the United States would lift economic sanctions on Syria imposed during the Assad regime.  Trump said in Riyadh(https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-starts-gulf-visit-seeking-big-economic-deals-2025-05-13/), “Oh...


Starmer’s turn against Israel will prolong war

Removing the ayatollahs in Iran is the only route to securing longterm peace in Gaza Israel is now grappling with possibly the last phases of eliminating the Hamas terrorist threat. Instead of support from a unified West determined to extirpate terrorism, however, Jerusalem is under attack for attempting exactly...


Will Trump Blow Up the National Security Council?

May 19, 2025

President Trump is reportedly considering(https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/rubio-working-major-changes-national-security-council-rcna206658) major alterations to the National Security Advisor’s role and the National Security Council staff.  One administration source said(https://www.cnn.com/2025/05/14/politics/rubio-national-security-council-overhaul) the “NSC as we know it is done.”  The potential changes center apparently on reducing the staff and its responsibility for developing and coordinating policy formulation,...


ABOUT JOHN BOLTON

Ambassador John Bolton, a diplomat and a lawyer, has spent many years in public service. He served as the U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations in 2005-2006. He was Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security from 2001 to 2005. In the Reagan Administration, he was an Assistant Attorney General.