US National Security Advisor John Bolton has always been one of the least appealing characters on the right wing of American politics. The jingoism! The belligerence! The comedy mustache!
How remarkable is it, then, to see that in the current nasty spat between the US and Turkey, Bolton seems to be the only player showing any decency. Trump's decision to order a speedy withdrawal of US forces from Syria seems to have been a spur-of-the-moment decision taken after a phone call with Turkish President Erdogan. Nobody from the US military had any kind of heads-up on this, and even before the first GI started packing for the journey home, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis quit, firing off a very harshly-worded letter to Trump into the bargain.
One of the many concerns raised by Trump's impetuousness was the fate of the Kurds who have been doing a lot of the front-line fighting against ISIS alongside the US. Turkey sees all Kurds as terrorists, and as soon as the US decision was made public, began an ominous troop buildup on the border of the Syrian territory currently held by the Kurds.
Bolton, presumably as taken aback as everyone else by Trump's announcement, stated on a visit to the Middle East that the US would not fully withdraw from Syria until it was assured that its erstwhile allies, the Kurds, would be safe. At this Erdogan flew into a rage, making it clear that his deal with President Trump would override anything that Bolton or anyone else might say. It hardly needs to be said that this reaction makes Turkey's intentions towards the Kurds crystal clear.
The US has always had a mixed reputation on the international stage -- a bad country to have as an enemy, but sometimes an even worse one to have as an ally. Abandoning the Kurds to their fate would be immoral in itself, and potentially damaging to any future US military joint ventures -- who wants to risk being thrown to the wolves at a moment's notice?
Trump's problem is that he really cannot tell America's friends from its enemies. Erdogan and Kim Jong Un? Strongmen we can do business with. European Union? A rival. Canada and Mexico? Unscrupulous trading partners. If Trump now decides to throw the unlovable John Bolton under the bus to appease Erdogan, US relations with the rest of the world will plunge to new depths of distrust.
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