inside the glass house

Does a ‘bare-knuckled political brawler’ augur well for UN?
NEW YORK-- The Senate Foreign Relations Committee will next week either confirm or reject John Bolton's nomination as the new U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

If he survives the devastating onslaught on him by the opposition Democrats in the committee, Bolton will be arriving at the UN armed with a mandate to shake the very foundations of the 60-year-old world body.

The committee has eight Senators from the Democratic Party and ten from the ruling Republican party. And unless the Republicans defect, Bolton will survive the vote. "A vote for John Bolton is a vote for reform at the United Nations," says White House spokesman Scott McClellan. "A vote against him is a vote for the status quo at the United Nations."

So the survival of the UN now depends on whether or not the Senate Foreign Relations Committee confirms Bolton, described as a bare-knuckled political brawler known for his contemptuous treatment of subordinates.

Perhaps the best characterisation came from Carl Ford, the State Department's former intelligence chief, who said bluntly that Bolton was "a quintessential kiss-up, kick-down kind of guy. He's got a bigger kick, and it gets bigger and stronger the further down the bureaucracy he's kicking."

The operative word was "bully" because Bolton has had a notoriety for abusing his authority and intimidating staffers. If the characterisation is true, Bolton seems to be the worst possible candidate for multilateral diplomacy which involves interaction with 190 member states, not excluding Sri Lanka.

Described as a "serial abuser" of subordinates, Bolton is being sent to help reform and restructure the UN which is facing its own problems of mismanagement, fraud, nepotism and sexual harassment.

At a committee hearing last month, he told Senators that he has had a 16-year relationship with Secretary-General Kofi Annan "based on mutual respect and friendship."

He told the committee that when he called Annan recently, the secretary-general reportedly said: "Get yourself confirmed quickly." But did Annan really make that comment? Asked to confirm, UN spokesman Fred Eckhard left the question hanging: "We aren't saying anything about what was said in that phone conversation, which was private."

Since he has publicly criticised the UN and made some of the most outrageous statements against the world body, one wonders whether Bolton really wants the job of UN ambassador. Unless, he wants to politically destroy the institution he loves to hate.

"There is no such thing as the United Nations," Bolton once remarked. "There is an international community that occasionally can be led by the only real power left in the world, and that is the United States, when it suits our interest and we can get others to go along."

"If the UN secretariat building in New York lost 10 stories," he once remarked, "it wouldn't make a bit of difference." He also pronounced negative judgements on international treaties, dismissing them as "not legally obligatory," and labelling the International Court of Justice as "a pretend court." Bolton is also opposed to arms control agreements.

As stories of his intolerable behaviour continued to hit the news media, the Washington Post humourist Art Buchwald wrote a hilarious spoof last week of likely Bolton antics if the UN has the misfortune to welcome him as the new US envoy.

Buchwald visualises a diplomatic slugfest with the French ambassador, as Bolton asks him to step outside "and I'll knock your teeth out." And the French ambassador says: "I don't want to step outside and fight you. I am a black belt in karate and a kick boxer, but my instructions are to solve all disputes in the UN diplomatically."

According to Buchwald, Bolton's response is characteristic of US diplomacy: "My instructions from Washington are to do anything to win. And if any country disagrees with us, we'll shove the veto down their throats."

But the best comical episode visualised by Buchwald is Bolton chasing the Cuban ambassador down the corridors outside the Security Council chambers.

The Cuban flees into the men's room and locks himself up, as Bolton keeps banging the door shouting: "Fidel, or whatever your name is, if you don't come out in three minutes, we'll bomb Havana." If Bolton runs true to form, Buchwald may not be proved wrong.

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