Just three days after FBI agents raided his home and office in a classified documents case, former National Security Adviser John Bolton penned a blistering guest column in the Washington Examiner, accusing former President Donald Trump of mishandling the war in Ukraine and sowing chaos in U.S. foreign policy.
“President Donald Trump’s Ukraine policy is no more coherent today than it was last Friday when his administration executed search warrants against my home and office,” Bolton wrote.
He argued that Trump’s negotiations were “collapsing in confusion, haste, and the absence of any discernible meeting of the minds” among Ukraine, Russia, Europe, and the United States.
Bolton mocked Trump’s social media comparison of himself to former President Richard Nixon during the Cold War “kitchen debate” with Nikita Khrushchev, noting Nixon “was the only president who resigned in disgrace.”
He also faulted Trump for publicly insisting Ukraine could only win by striking inside Russia, even as his own Pentagon blocked Kyiv from launching those attacks. Bolton said Moscow’s strike on a U.S.-owned factory in Ukraine underscored the administration’s disarray.
According to Bolton, Kyiv is fighting “for freedom and independence” while Moscow is bent on rebuilding the old Russian empire. These irreconcilable goals, he wrote, mean that even a ceasefire would not bring real peace so long as the Kremlin “maintains its imperialist aims.”
Bolton added that Trump’s labeling of the conflict as “senseless” and “ridiculous” ignored the reality on the ground. He argued the former president’s breakneck pace to force a resolution over the past two weeks was one of several major blunders.
“His efforts over the last two-plus weeks may have left us further from peace and a just settlement for Ukraine than before,” Bolton concluded.
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