In the wake of the United States’s action in Venezuela, which resulted in the capture of President Nicolas Maduro, CNN brought out John Bolton.
Bolton joined CNN’s Kaitlan Collins to express his opinions, specifically on President Donald Trump’s behavior toward Maria Corina Machado, the country’s opposition leader.
Watch:
“Well, I think this does go back to the first term. Trump was very interested in the Venezuelan oil. He didn‘t really understand the situation, he said to me at one point in 2018, ‘Venezuela used to be part of the United States.’ But this idea, removing the Maduro regime, was something we were able to get him interested in. We couldn‘t keep him focused on it. I think [Secretary of State] Marco Rubio had a lot more success in the second term,” Bolton said. “And I think that‘s what led to what happened last night, the very, very successful military operation that extracted Maduro and his wife from Venezuela.”
“I think everything else, though, other than the military planning and preparation, is being done on an ad hoc basis. Not well thought out, and it shows clearly, as clearly as anything I can imagine. Trump does not have a philosophy, he does not have a national security strategy, he doesn‘t do policy the way we understand that. This is what we‘re proposing, what he‘s doing in Venezuela, completely different from what he said during the 2024 campaign about ending endless wars. It‘s all because, in the moment, at this time, he sees the possibility for success, which is, to my mind, very much up in the air,” he added.
When asked by Collins to clarify that the action against Venezuela didn’t happen because the president was “distracted,” Bolton reiterated that this was something that had been pushed for under Trump’s first term.
“Well, I don‘t think we could get him to focus on it. And I don‘t think the opposition in Venezuela at that time really wanted military force. They thought that with economic pressure, they could split the Maduro regime. I don‘t think we applied sufficient economic pressure. There were a lot of other things we could have done, particularly considering military force, that didn‘t happen. I think this time, Trump was persuaded, obviously, to engage in it because of Rubio‘s persistence and because of the political benefits I think they could see in Florida and elsewhere,” Bolton said. “I‘m delighted Maduro has been extracted. But I think what you didn‘t get from that press conference today is that he may be gone, but the regime is still there. And the notion of how you‘re going to change that is very, very much up in the air. And what I have to say, the most stunning part about the press conference was probably saying the U.S. was going to run the country, but the second most stunning was the assault on Mrs. Machado, the leader of the democratic forces. The natural alternative government that Trump just dismissed.”
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Sierra Marlee is a millennial whose hunger for the truth in a world of fake news has led her to write. Marlee also contributes to BizPac Review.
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