As a friend of mine inside the State Department recently told me, I have a slew of friends inside the Department and in the nooks and crannies of Bolton's world who want Bolton Watch to play a constructive role in helping Condoleezza Rice to supervise him. We are happy to oblige.

Ambassador Bolton has tried from the beginning of his tenure to bring moral clarity to his job and to eschew the usual diplomatic evasions of the truth. He has expended tireless efforts to press the UN to reform itself and to restore its original mission, while protecting the vital interests of the United States. He has won begrudging respect from other UN diplomats but has continued to encounter rear guard interference on the home front.

When Bolton first arrived at his post last summer, for example, he dug right into the preparations for the Millennium+5 General Assembly summit meeting. Unlike most senior diplomats, Bolton actually read the main summit “outcome” document the heads of state were being asked to adopt at the summit. He wanted the document to reflect a real, measurable commitment to UN reform. If the U.S. is expected to pay nearly a quarter of the UN’s budget, he reasoned, American taxpayers should expect to see a well-run, transparent organization that delivers value for the money they contribute. But that is not the UN way, where the free-riding countries dominating the General Assembly pass the budget on their terms and pass the bill on to us. Bolton’s superiors were not willing to press the point. Bolton also wanted to eliminate the specific references in the summit document to financing of the UN’s Millennium Development Goals through development aid contributions collected from each developed country based on a fixed 0.7 percent of each developed country’s gross national product. If implemented, this could cost American taxpayers nearly a trillion dollars of additional foreign aid over the next ten years. Again, Bolton’s superiors at the State Department caved. They overrode Bolton’s objection to including the 0.7 percent assessment target in the summit document, leaving Bolton hanging out to dry.

This pattern has accelerated in recent weeks. While initially backing Bolton in opposing the General Assembly’s decision to set up the seriously flawed UN Human Rights Council, his superiors are now willing to look the other way even as Bolton’s predictions about the Council’s wayward direction are starting to come true. The first election for membership on the Council proved that it is only marginally better than the discredited Human Rights Commission that it replaced. Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Azerbaijan, Pakistan, Algeria, Tunisia, Cameroon, China and Russia were elected. They are all ranked “not free” by Freedom House. Six of these countries will serve on the Human Rights Council for the maximum three year term. At the same time, the entire number of seats on the Human Rights Council allotted to the more democratic “Western European and Others Group” (including North America, Australia, and New Zealand) was limited to seven nations, only three of which will have three year terms. The imbalance against the representation of democratic values on the Human Rights Council is palpable. Ambassador Bolton called it as he saw it, saying that the new Council looked set to inherit the flaws of its predecessor. Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Kristin Silverberg, on the other hand, chose to put on a happy face, declaring: “On the whole, we think it is an improvement over the commission.” If Bolton had his way, we would be well along the path towards a decision to withhold any funding for this farce. But higher-ups evidently feel it is better to win a few popularity points by continuing to subsidize the flawed Human Rights Council than stand up for principle.

And then there is Iran. Ambassador Bolton has delivered a consistent, unambiguous message. He believes that the Security Council should vote immediately on a resolution under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter directing Iran to suspend its nuclear program. Such a resolution would be enforceable under international law and provide the basis for economic sanctions and even military action if Iran continues to dig in its heels. The time for talking with Iran is over, Bolton believes. “We have nothing to say to them,” he was quoted as saying last month to the Philadelphia Inquirer. Bolton also told a Congressional panel in early May that if the Security Council failed to act, the United States would pursue other multilateral alternatives to the UN to take effective action against Iran. We were on course to force an up or down Security Council vote last week. Secretary of State Rice appeared to be on the same page until just the last few days, when she suddenly did an about face and agreed to go along with a new European ‘carrot and stick’ approach that could include offers of civilian nuclear energy, trade and technological cooperation and even security guarantees. Europe has already gone down that road for years without any success. The Iranian government bought time for their nuclear enrichment program, while continuing to move the goal posts for a negotiated settlement. Now they will have even more time thanks to Rice. She said the following in endorsing the carrot and postponing the stick:

“Now, Iran can have a civil nuclear programme. No one is disputing that. They can have scientific progress. No one is disputing that. But because of the history here, the fuel cycle - enrichment and reprocessing on Iranian territory - is a  problem. That is what the international community has asked them to suspend and to come back to negotiations.”

AND

We agreed that we will continue to seek a (UN) Security Council resolution, but that we would wait for a couple of weeks while the Europeans design an offer to the Iranians that would make clear that they have a choice that would allow them   to have a civil nuclear program.”

Does anybody seriously think that any minds will be changed in two weeks? If you do, here is what Rice said back in January. As Yogi Berra once remarked, “It’s deja-vu all over again”:

Well, when the European 3 in Berlin came out and asked for this extraordinary meeting of the Board of Governors, they did so, so there has -- there could be a referral by the Security Council. I would like to remind people that several months ago, we actually had a resolution to refer Iran to the Security Council, but decided to not act on that resolution, so that Iran would have time to demonstrate that it was prepared to return to the talks with the EU-3 or perhaps look at the Russian proposal seriously…The Iranian incentive should be to get back into good standing in the international community and that means to accept a proposal for peaceful nuclear energy development that does not raise proliferation concerns by giving Iran access to enriching and reprocessing technology. That's really what this is about. It's that simple. The Iranians have many proposals that they could accept.

John Bolton may just be too smart and too honest for this crowd. Senator Joe Biden once reportedly said to Bolton in a confirmation hearing for the position of Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, which Bolton secured in 2003: “This is not about your competence. My problem with you over the years has been you have been too competent. I mean, I would rather you be stupid and not very effective.”

We need someone competent and effective to shake things up at the United Nations and bring a dose of reality to that dysfunctional organization. Yet Bolton’s enemies in the State Department did everything they could to torpedo his confirmation for the UN ambassadorship. From the moment of his recess appointment by President Bush, Bolton’s enemies have set about to sabotage him and sway Rice to override him at the UN. By marginalizing Bolton, they are doing a disservice to our country. President Bush should step in and tell his underlings not to interfere with what Bolton is doing at the UN, and let Bolton be Bolton.

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