The real issue of dealing with proliferation of weapons of mass destruction: nuclear, chemical or biological is: What is your tolerance for risk? And my tolerance for risk for WMD proliferation is pretty close to zero. Because otherwise, we and our allies are at the mercy of regimes like Ahmadinejad and the mullahs in Tehran, or Kim Jong Il and the Hitler-in-the-bunker mentality in Pyongyang, or others who don't share our calculus on the value of human life.
John BoltonIran is barely over 50% Persian, and Arabs, Baluchis, Azeris, Kurds and many other groups feel left out of the society. That regime has a lot more weaknesses than people see.
John BoltonI'm a conservative Republican. I have been since I was 15 years old and participated in the 'Goldwater for President' campaign in 1964.
John BoltonThe Iranian government is the government that supplied the arms on the Karin-A to the Palestinian Authority several years ago, they are the world's largest central banker for terrorism, if they thought it was in their interest to give a terrorist group a nuclear weapon to use against America or against Israel, I don't think they'd hesitate.
John BoltonI think the future of China's unknown, I don't know what direction it's going to go in. It could go in the right direction, it could. It could go in a very bad direction, too.
John BoltonI have looked at public opinion polls in France in the late 1940s and early 1950s during the height of Marshall Plan aid. They had a very negative attitude towards the United States then. There were negative attitudes towards the United States because of Vietnam. There were negative attitudes about the United States when Reagan wanted to deploy intermediate range ballistic missiles. I don't think the president should base his foreign policy on American public opinion polls, let alone foreign public opinion polls.
John Bolton