| PRESS DIGEST-British Business - Sept 11 Posted: 10 Sep 2019 05:17 PM PDT ![PRESS DIGEST-British Business - Sept 11]( "PRESS DIGEST-British Business - Sept 11") The following are the top stories on the business pages of British newspapers. - German carmaker Bayerische Motoren Werke AG said the Mini factory near Oxford will close from Oct. 31 in the event of a no-deal Brexit, with thousands of workers at the plant going unpaid. - Bovis Homes Group Plc is back in talks with Galliford Try Plc to buy its housing business three months after an earlier offer was rejected as too low and not in the interests of shareholders.
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| North Korea’s Kim Oversaw Test of ‘Super-Large’ Missile Launcher Posted: 10 Sep 2019 05:16 PM PDT ![North Korea's Kim Oversaw Test of 'Super-Large' Missile Launcher]( "North Korea's Kim Oversaw Test of 'Super-Large' Missile Launcher") (Bloomberg) -- North Korean leader Kim Jong Un oversaw the test of a "super-large multiple rocket launcher" the state's media said of the military display that came shortly after Pyongyang announced it was willing to restart nuclear talks with the U.S.Kim, military leaders and top officials "in the field of national defense science" saw two rounds of test fire Tuesday of "tactical guided weapons including super-large multiple rocket launcher," the official Korean Central News Agency said a day after the launches. South Korea said North Korea fired "short-range projectiles" into its eastern seas that flew about 330 kilometers (200 miles).North Korea Tests More Weapons After Floating Fresh U.S. Talks"The Supreme Leader said that the weapon system of super-large multiple rocket launcher has been finally verified in terms of combat operation," KCNA said. It also released photos of the test that showed a smiling Kim, who has been on hand for almost all of his state's series of missiles and weapon tests that started in May, standing by a launcher.The Tuesday test came shortly after a top North Korean diplomat, Choe Son Hui, issued a statement saying the country would be willing to hold talks "at the time and place to be agreed late in September." North Korea often ratchets up military tensions ahead of negotiations intended to end its nuclear ambitions.The North Korean statement cited recent comments by U.S. officials expressing a desire for negotiations and made no mention of any new concessions. The remarks, which follow a speech Friday by lead U.S. negotiator Stephen Biegun, represented some of the regime's most positive remarks about talks since President Donald Trump's June 30 meeting with Kim.Biegun's remarks last week highlighted that almost no progress has been made toward an agreement on North Korea's nuclear program despite three meetings between Trump and Kim. After their latest meeting, the U.S. said Kim had agreed to begin detailed negotiations by mid-July.Kim, who has suspended testing of nuclear weapons and intercontinental ballistic missiles while engaged in talks with the U.S., has given Trump until the end of the year to ease up on sanctions choking his state's anemic economy. At the same time, he has threatened to take a "new path," if the U.S. doesn't change course.Most of North Korea's recent tests since May have been of a new missile known as the KN-23, which weapons experts said can deliver a nuclear warhead to all of South Korea and parts of Japan and is designed to evade U.S. missile interceptors.To contact the reporter on this story: Jon Herskovitz in Tokyo at jherskovitz@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Brendan Scott at bscott66@bloomberg.net, Peter PaeFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Pompeo Is ‘Last Man Standing’ After Bolton Departs White House Posted: 10 Sep 2019 04:38 PM PDT ![Pompeo Is 'Last Man Standing' After Bolton Departs White House]( "Pompeo Is 'Last Man Standing' After Bolton Departs White House") (Bloomberg) -- The end of John Bolton's fractious tenure as national security adviser leaves one man at the helm of the Trump administration's foreign policy as it manages crises from Iran to North Korea: Secretary of State Michael Pompeo.From the moment Bolton arrived at the White House in April 2018, he brought a hawkish foreign policy vision honed over decades -- a mindset that would inevitably collide with the unorthodox style of Donald Trump and culminate in his firing on Tuesday. Bolton's approach stood in contrast to Pompeo's deference to the president, first as Central Intelligence Agency chief and then as secretary of state.Pompeo is now without peer on Trump's national security team. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper is weeks into his job, there's no confirmed director of national intelligence and United Nations Ambassador Kelly Craft was confirmed on Tuesday. Among the president's advisers, Pompeo will have the biggest sway on decisions about brokering a deal with Iran, restarting talks with North Korea and finding a way to draw down forces in Afghanistan."Last man standing," James Dobbins, a senior fellow at the Rand Corp., said of Pompeo, though he quickly added that it's "unclear whether he guides or just anticipates the president."Read More: Failed Afghan Talks Underscore Trump's Foreign Policy SetbacksPompeo rarely displays any emotion beyond impatience when he answers questions from reporters. But he was almost jocular during a news conference with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Tuesday when asked about Bolton's departure.Trump "should have people he trusts and values, and whose efforts and judgments benefit him in delivering American foreign policy," Pompeo said. He added that he never talks about internal administration matters, then promptly did: "There were definitely places that Ambassador Bolton and I had different views about how we should proceed."As the last remaining member of Trump's original national security cabinet, Pompeo has proved adept at making sure no distance emerges between his and the president's views. It's a rule that Bolton and his predecessor, H.R. McMaster, along with ex-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, couldn't resist breaking.Pompeo's ascendancy also reverses a decade-long trend that saw the State Department relinquish control over foreign policy as the National Security Council gained influence.The former Kansas congressman, who joined the administration as director of the CIA, moved quickly when he arrived at the State Department, naming envoys reporting directly to him to manage American policy toward North Korea, Iran, Venezuela, Afghanistan and Syria. Since then, it's been that group that has largely been charged with pressing Trump's prerogatives.Bolton had the advantage of working near the Oval Office and far more experience in the executive branch as a former United Nations ambassador and a key architect of President George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq. Yet he was often reduced to playing the role of spoiler.Bolton and his team stymied the State Department in the spring when it wanted to extend waivers to allow Iran to export some of its oil. And he vehemently objected to an Afghanistan peace plan drawn up by Pompeo's staff that would have seen the U.S. withdraw troops in exchange for security guarantees from the Taliban.There were other signs of discord. When Trump stepped across the border into North Korea for a brief meeting with Kim Jong Un in June, Bolton was in Mongolia. Before joining the administration, he long called for preemptive strikes on Iran over its nuclear program, while Trump has said he wants to sit down with the Islamic Republic's leaders."This break has been building for a long time and finally culminated with the fiasco that ensued over the Afghanistan talks," said Suzanne DiMaggio, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "Having someone like Bolton on the team who is so strong in his opinions, that comes in handy when he's agreeing with you, but when he's not, it can be a major irritation."Yet Bolton's views, while sometimes extreme, generally aligned with ideas shared by many conservatives, melding an interventionist approach with a willingness to escalate pressure on adversaries. He coupled that with a willingness to engage in bureaucratic infighting, which made enemies within agencies and among those who had the president's ear.Pompeo's staff had been in open conflict with Bolton's for months, with State Department officials deriding Bolton aides for demanding updates on policy issues over which Pompeo had control."There's no question the knives were out for John," said Danielle Pletka, senior vice president of foreign and defense policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, where Bolton was once a senior fellow. "He's a conservative hawk, period, that's what he is."When Bolton came into the job, it seemed like he would use it as a chance to to fulfill some of his long-held foreign-policy goals, such as driving a stake into the International Criminal Court, abrogating a range of arms-control treaties and getting the U.S. out of the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran.Ultimately, the biggest difference between Bolton and Pompeo may have been less about policy than how effectively they negotiated the tumultuous world of the Trump presidency, a roller coaster that has seen unprecedented senior staff turnover."At the end of the day I think a lot of his own instincts actually did coincide with Bolton's, especially on Iran, so it's unclear to me if things are handed off to Pompeo exclusively how much things will change," DiMaggio said.But style can be substance. Pompeo has said that when he disagrees with the president, he takes those concerns directly to him. Then he falls into line."I work hard for the president of the United States, who was constitutionally elected," Pompeo told "CBS This Morning" last month. "He is my leader, my task is to share with him the best information."Once Trump makes a decision, Pompeo said, "it is my task to go execute that with all the energy and power that I have."It's not clear how long Pompeo will remain in Trump's orbit. He is widely believed to harbor aspirations for the Senate and could run for an open seat in Kansas next year. But for now his position in the president's inner circle appears solid. Trump summed up his favorite part of the dynamic with Pompeo during an interview with New York magazine in October 2018."I argue with everyone except Pompeo," Trump said. "I don't think I've had an argument with Pompeo."To contact the reporter on this story: Nick Wadhams in Washington at nwadhams@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Bill Faries at wfaries@bloomberg.net, John HarneyFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Trump ousts hawkish Bolton, dissenter on foreign policy Posted: 10 Sep 2019 04:26 PM PDT  President Donald Trump on Tuesday abruptly forced out John Bolton, his hawkish national security adviser with whom he had strong disagreements on Iran, Afghanistan and a cascade of other global challenges. The sudden shake-up marked the latest departure of a prominent voice of dissent from the president's inner circle, as Trump has grown less accepting of advice contrary to his instincts. It also comes at a trying moment for Trump on the world stage, weeks ahead of the United Nations General Assembly and as the president faces pressing decisions on difficult foreign policy issues.
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| Tensions over Afghan talks ended with Bolton's exit-sources Posted: 10 Sep 2019 04:10 PM PDT ![Tensions over Afghan talks ended with Bolton's exit-sources]( "Tensions over Afghan talks ended with Bolton's exit-sources") U.S. President Donald Trump and adviser John Bolton were always unlikely foreign policy allies, with Bolton skeptical of Trump's outreach on North Korea and efforts to woo Russian President Vladimir Putin and supportive of an Iraq war hated by his boss. Trump's pursuit of a dialogue with Taliban leaders over the future of Afghanistan proved to be a bridge too far, however, and now the president is on the hunt for his fourth national security adviser. Two sources familiar with the matter said one thing that bothered Trump was the possibility that Bolton let it be known that Vice President Mike Pence shared his opposition to Trump's effort to bring Taliban leaders to the presidential retreat of Camp David, Maryland, to try to reach a peace deal.
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| Two British-Australian women 'detained in Iran' as tensions grow over tanker Posted: 10 Sep 2019 03:46 PM PDT  Two British-Australian women have reportedly been arrested and detained in Iran amid growing tensions between London and Tehran. A blogger who was travelling with her Australian boyfriend and an academic who studied at Cambridge University were seized in separate incidents, according to The Times. The blogger was detained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard for camping in a military precinct around Jajrood in Tehran province, the BBC reported. The pair are believed to have been incarcerated in Evin Jail, Tehran, where 41-year old Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is being held. The mother of one is a British-Iranian national who has been imprisoned in the country since 2016. The latest incidents are thought to be the first time British passport holders who do not have Iranian nationality have been imprisoned in Tehran in recent years. The Foreign Office reportedly requested that the women remained anonymous. The Australian government is taking the lead on both cases. Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe timeline Tulip Siddiq, who is Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe's Labour MP, told The Times: "This terrible news shows a clear escalation of Iran's hostage diplomacy. Soft diplomatic responses to Iran's illegal and inhumane treatment of British prisoners have been a failure." The Foreign Office declined to comment. It states on its website: "There is a risk that British nationals, and a higher risk that British-Iranian dual nationals, could be arbitrarily detained in Iran. All British nationals should consider carefully the risks of travelling to Iran." The news came as Britain accused accused Tehran of an "unacceptable" breach of international norms after it apparently broke a promise that an oil tanker detained off Gibraltar this summer would not deliver oil to Syria. Dominic Raab, the Foreign Secretary, summoned the Iranian ambassador on Tuesday afternoon following reports that the Adrian Darya 1, which was at the centre of a diplomatic crisis after being seized by Royal Marines in July, had delivered a cargo of crude oil to the Syrian port of Tartus. Britain says Iran repeatedly gave assurances that the ship would not deliver oil to any EU-sanctioned entity in Syria or elsewhere before it was released last month. Mr Raab said: "Iran has shown complete disregard for its own assurances over Adrian Darya 1. "This sale of oil to Assad's brutal regime is part of a pattern of behaviour by the Government of Iran designed to disrupt regional security. This includes illegally supplying weapons to Houthi insurgents in Yemen, support for Hezbollah terrorists and most recently its attempts to hijack commercial ships passing through the Gulf. Iran tensions | Read more "We want Iran to come in from the cold but the only way to do that is to keep its word and comply with the rules-based international system." The Adrian Darya 1, known as the Grace 1 until it was renamed by its owners last month, was seized by Gibraltar authorities and Royal Marine Commandos acting on intelligence that it was bound for Syria on July 4. Britain and Gibraltar said the move was to enforce European Union sanctions that forbid the supply of oil to the regime of Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian dictator. It was released in August after a court in Gibraltar accepted assurances that the vessel would not breach the sanctions, and rejected a last-minute US bid to have it impounded. But the vessel spent several days meandering near the Syrian coast and turned off its transponder before apparently making its delivery last week.
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| UN envoy: It's 'imperative' to start Afghan-Taliban talks Posted: 10 Sep 2019 03:40 PM PDT  The U.N. envoy for Afghanistan said Tuesday it is imperative for direct talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban to start quickly, and he urged the militant Islamist group to retract its threat to disrupt the upcoming presidential election. Yamamoto spoke three days after President Donald Trump abruptly halted U.S.-Taliban talks, citing an upsurge in attacks by the Islamic insurgent group. The cancellation put a spotlight on the Sept. 28 presidential election.
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| UPDATE 1-N.Korea carried out super-large multiple rocket launcher test on Tuesday -KCNA Posted: 10 Sep 2019 02:48 PM PDT ![UPDATE 1-N.Korea carried out super-large multiple rocket launcher test on Tuesday -KCNA]( "UPDATE 1-N.Korea carried out super-large multiple rocket launcher test on Tuesday -KCNA") North Korean leader Kim Jong Un oversaw the testing of a super-large multiple rocket launcher on Tuesday, North Korean state media KCNA said on Wednesday. North Korea fired a new round of short-range projectiles on Tuesday, South Korean officials said, only hours after it signalled a new willingness to resume stalled denuclearisation talks with the United States in late September. Kim, who had guided the testing of the same multiple rocket launcher before, said its capabilities have been "finally verified in terms of combat operation," and what remains to be done with the rocket launcher is a "running fire test," KCNA said, without elaborating on what the test would entail.
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| Trump says he's fired National Security Adviser John Bolton Posted: 10 Sep 2019 02:46 PM PDT  President Donald Trump on Tuesday tweeted that he had fired National Security Adviser John Bolton amid reports of conflict among the president's foreign policy advisers over Afghanistan, North Korea and other matters. "I informed John Bolton last night that his services are no longer needed at the White House.
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| Did Trump and Bolton Break Over Iran—or the Leaks? Posted: 10 Sep 2019 02:40 PM PDT  Photo Illustration by Sarah Rogers/The Daily Beast / Photo Sergei Gapon/GettyWhen President Donald Trump announced in 2017 that the U.S. would leave the Iran nuclear deal, his administration already had a plan in place. The Trump team didn't want to back away quietly from the accord. Instead, it wanted total economic annihilation of Tehran, the government's military proxies, and its most powerful business sectors in order to compel the Iranians to renegotiate or to convince the people of Iran to rise up against the regime.The White House and State Department pulled in outside experts from prominent hawkish think tanks to help. But the main architect of that policy was John Bolton. For years, Bolton had been steadfast in his strategy of maximum pressure against Tehran. And in April 2018, he found himself in a position to turn that advocacy into a reality after Trump tapped him to serve as his national security adviser. The marriage was not to be. Though the Trump administration has increasingly adopted a hard line on Iran, the president himself gradually drifting away from the hawkish approach that Bolton personified.Things came to a head over the last few weeks, according to two U.S. officials and three individuals involved in national security policy in the Trump administration. In conversations with the former national security adviser and others, Trump said he was considering meeting Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in September. One of the main asks by the Iranian regime for such a meeting was that the U.S. agree upfront to ease some sanctions on the country.Why the Trump-Bolton Marriage Was Doomed From the StartFor Bolton, the fact that Trump was even considering the request was the final straw, according to three U.S. officials—because it was evidence that the president had lost trust in his counsel. One U.S. official told Time magazine that as Bolton and Trump talked one last time, the conversation quickly centered around the question: "Why are you meeting with Rouhani?"On Tuesday, Trump announced that he had fired Bolton, citing disagreements "with many of his suggestions." Bolton quickly disputed being fired, telling The Daily Beast—among other outlets—that he had offered his resignation the night before.Whether he was forced out or left willingly merely obscures the fact that his final months on Team Trump were filled with tension, infighting, and increasingly divergent world views. The level of trust between the president and his now former national security adviser had rapidly deteriorated—to the point that President Trump had told several advisers to keep an eye on Bolton for press leaks and backstabbing.Two senior administration officials say that in recent weeks each had directly complained to Trump—including in the Oval Office—about Bolton, and their beliefs that the foreign-policy hawk was a prolific leaker to the media, including when he would lose out on internal squabbles and policy fights. The president, the sources noted, did not explicitly agree with their suspicions, but in both cases asked the venting official to be vigilant and report back to him with anything he needed to know.Trumpworld Gloats as Bolton BoltsOn Tuesday afternoon, Bolton messaged The Daily Beast that allegations that he was a leaker are "flatly incorrect." But the image of him as someone who dished about internal affairs was potent enough that it was offered up by Hill Republicans as a perfectly acceptable rationale for Trump to have given him the axe. "I like John Bolton," said Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). "I thought he did a good job, I shared his worldview, however I think the trust was lost—there's a view that the leaking allegation is pretty sensitive to the president."While Bolton may or may not have leaked, he certainly didn't carry water, at least not to the degree that Trump famously demands. Multiple sources confirmed that the national security adviser ducked out of "soft-booked" and scheduled Sunday-show interviews over the summer explicitly because he didn't want to didn't want to defend Trump on several issues.The points of disagreement were not small, either. Two officials told The Daily Beast that Bolton argued aggressively against the president bringing representatives from the Taliban and the Kabul government to Camp David for a formal meeting, telling Trump that the optics of bringing members of the Taliban on U.S. soil so close to 9/11 would be inappropriate. Trump ultimately canceled the meeting. But one other official said Bolton also advised him to keep U.S. troops in Afghanistan beyond the 2020 presidential election—something the president has vehemently opposed. Bolton's hawkish advocacy, and unbending nature, had made him enemies in the upper echelons of the administration. He departed with few senior officials willing to pat him on the back on his way out. At a press briefing on Tuesday, neither Secretary of State Mike Pompeo nor Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin showed much sadness."There were many times Ambassador Bolton and I disagreed," Pompeo told reporters. "That's to be sure, but that's true with a lot of people with whom I interact."For several hours on Tuesday, Trump and his senior staff seemed to go out of their way to trash the just-departed Bolton on the record, via tweets and text messages. Bolton was more than happy to return fire in this quintessentially Trumpian flame war. At times, it devolved into an online debate between a president and his former national security adviser over whether this was a case of "you can't fire me, I quit," or the other way around.The mechanics of the dismissal were of less importance to foreign policy hands than the political outcomes that would result from it. Having advocated for years for the U.S. government to get demonstrably more aggressive towards Iran, Bolton's departure almost certainly made a diplomatic overture more likely. "Bolton's departure doesn't make a Trump-Rouhani meeting on the sidelines of UNGA a foregone conclusion. But it makes it somewhat more likely. An absolute precondition for any such encounter on Iran's side is a relaxation of U.S. sanctions," said Robert Malley, a former member of the National Security Council under President Obama. "We know that Trump was open to such a relaxation—and that Bolton was fundamentally opposed. There are still many obstacles to the Trump-Rouhani encounter, and Iran will want a substantial price for what it deems a substantial step. But at least one of those obstacles has just been removed."—With additional reporting by Sam Stein and Sam BrodeyTrump Wanted to Boast About His Own 'Camp David Accords' Before Taliban Deal CollapsedRead more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Trump fires hawkish national security chief Bolton Posted: 10 Sep 2019 02:30 PM PDT  President Donald Trump on Tuesday announced the firing of hawkish national security advisor John Bolton, a move widely seen as boosting the president's push to negotiate with US foes in Afghanistan, North Korea and other trouble spots. A replacement -- the White House's fourth national security chief in less than three years -- would be named next week, Trump said.
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| Four Ways That Britain’s Brexit Drama Could Play Out Next Posted: 10 Sep 2019 02:30 PM PDT ![Four Ways That Britain's Brexit Drama Could Play Out Next]( "Four Ways That Britain's Brexit Drama Could Play Out Next") (Bloomberg) -- Where does Brexit go next? What can Boris Johnson do? Only a fool would offer a prediction, but here are some possible paths.Johnson Gets a DealPerhaps the prime minister agrees to a border in the Irish Sea. Perhaps the European Union cracks and offers some modifications to the parts of the deal struck by his predecessor, Theresa May, that address the contentious Irish border question.But can he get it through Parliament? Maybe. To do so, he would need to dramatically reduce the number of "Spartans" -- the 28 pro-Brexit Conservatives who never voted for May's deal. Two of them, Priti Patel and Theresa Villiers, are now in the cabinet, so they would probably get on board. To persuade the rest, Johnson could argue that he had got the best available deal, and that to reject it would mean breaking his pledge to get Britain out of the EU by Oct. 31. Johnson argues that failure would mean extinction for the Tories, and would potentially put Brexit in jeopardy.Johnson Goes for No-DealThe government's legal experts find a loophole in the law that was passed last week to force Johnson to seek an extension. Or Johnson simply ignores it, or somehow persuades the EU to reject his request for an extension. Britain leaves the EU without any agreement Oct. 31, and Johnson, needing a majority in Parliament, seeks an election.The outcome of that election would depend a lot on how a no-deal Brexit played out. If, as Johnson must hope, the disruption is minimal, he would be able to kill off Nigel Farage's Brexit Party, and present himself as the man who had finally delivered. The goal would be to pick up seats in Brexit-supporting areas to offset those lost in places angry with what the government had done. The danger for Johnson would be that of an election fought against a backdrop of roads blocked by trucks queued outside ports, shortages of food and medicine, factory closures, and a humiliating British return to the EU's negotiating table, asking for a deal after all.Johnson Backs DownHe said he'd rather be dead in a ditch than delay Brexit beyond Oct. 31. But unless he can get a deal, the law now says he must. Faced with the threat of mass resignations from his government if he refuses to obey the law, Johnson agrees to request an extension and, with it secured, asks Parliament for an election. This time, the opposition Labour Party agrees. Britain holds its first December election in nearly 100 years, with Johnson arguing that the people must take on Parliament.Having failed to meet his "do-or-die" pledge to get Britain out of the EU, Johnson fights the election a weakened figure, with the Brexit Party telling voters that only Farage can get the job done. The pro-Brexit vote is split, and Labour is the largest party in Parliament. Jeremy Corbyn is on the point of becoming prime minister, with a commitment to another Brexit referendum.Johnson Resigns or Is Forced OutHe can't break the law, he can't get round the law, but he won't obey the law, so the prime minister announces he's resigning. Or he tries to go for no-deal but loses a vote of confidence and is forced to quit. Who will succeed him?The Conservatives would want to pin a "Brexit betrayal" onto someone other than themselves, and then try to defeat them in the inevitable election. Johnson might suggest to Queen Elizabeth II that she invite Corbyn to form a government, but he might have less support among members of Parliament than Johnson. Possibly better from Labour's point of view would be to install someone else with a temporary mandate to seek a Brexit extension. Labour would block anyone else from their ranks, so a more neutral figure would be needed.Former Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer Ken Clarke is widely respected, and too old to pose much risk of trying to make his stay as prime minister a long one. Brexit is delayed, and an election is on, with Johnson seeking a mandate for no-deal, and Corbyn arguing for a second referendum. Even here Labour is split. The party's deputy leader, Tom Watson, will make a speech Wednesday arguing that the second Brexit referendum should come before the election.To contact the reporter on this story: Robert Hutton in London at rhutton1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Tim Ross at tross54@bloomberg.net, Robert JamesonFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Trump Plans Crackdown on Fentanyl Shipments from China, Others Posted: 10 Sep 2019 02:22 PM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- The Trump administration is considering an executive order to crack down on shipments of fentanyl and counterfeit goods, according to people familiar with the matter, a move aimed in part at pressuring China to help the U.S. combat its opioid epidemic.The draft order would target foreign shippers routing deliveries through the U.S. Postal Service -- not the two-largest U.S. couriers United Parcel Service Inc. and FedEx Corp., according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. One person familiar with the proposal said that China is a focus for the action, though the presidential order is not limited to that nation.Washington has criticized Beijing for not doing enough to curb the flow of fentanyl, a highly addictive painkiller that's played a role in the opioid epidemic blamed for thousands of deaths in the U.SPresident Donald Trump has linked the issue to trade talks, citing President Xi Jinping's failure to stop the smuggling of China-made fentanyl as a reason for hiking tariffs earlier this month on Chinese goods.Trump said Xi agreed, as part of a December 2018 temporary trade truce, to designate fentanyl as a controlled substance -- a move that would expose its sellers to the maximum penalty under Chinese law. Since then, Trump repeatedly said Xi broke his word.China has pushed back, arguing that the epidemic is due to the U.S.'s own lax regulation over the prescription of opioids to patients."I am ordering all carriers, including Fed Ex, Amazon, UPS and the Post Office, to SEARCH FOR & REFUSE all deliveries of Fentanyl from China (or anywhere else!). Fentanyl kills 100,000 Americans a year. President Xi said this would stop – it didn't," Trump said on Aug. 23 in a series of tweets, in which he also announced more tariffs and ordered American companies to immediately start looking for alternatives to China.The order, expected in coming months, will allow the U.S. Postal Service to stop doing business with foreign entities that are found to be shipping illegal goods or substances, the people said. Initially, an entity found in violation would be placed on a shame list. If the illegal shipments continue to come in after a 90-day period, the entity would be barred from delivering to the U.S., they said.While Trump mentioned private carriers like FedEx and UPS in his August tweet, two of the people said the plan is to hit foreign entities. Agencies like state-owned China Post, for instance, could face heightened scrutiny, they said.The White House declined to comment.USTR this year again placed China on its priority watchlist in an annual report that details other countries' intellectual-property practices. China continues to be the world's leading source of counterfeit goods, according to the April report."Right holders report that online sellers of counterfeit goods often advertise that orders will be fulfilled via China Post's express mail service and exploit the high volume of packages to the United States to escape enforcement," the report said.Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro, who is leading the effort on the executive order, often refers to the sale of fentanyl as one of what he calls China's "seven deadly sins." People briefed on the order said it's likely China would retaliate against the U.S. move.Chinese State-Run Paper Singles Out Navarro for Trade 'Lies'Beijing in recent weeks hit back at the U.S.'s claim that it wasn't doing enough to curtail the production and sale of fentanyl.In a document circulated by the Chinese embassy in Washington on Sept. 2, Beijing said its enhanced law enforcement activity had led to a "notable" drop in the number of smuggling cases of fentanyl-like substances to the U.S."Given the fundamental importance of preventing drug abuse in addressing the fentanyl issue in the U.S., China looks forward to stronger domestic regulation on the U.S. side," according to the paper.FedEx has been caught up in its own troubles in China. The Tennessee-based company has been under scrutiny in recent months after Huawei Technologies Co. said documents it asked to be shipped from Japan to China were diverted to the U.S. instead without authorization. In another incident, FedEx said it mistakenly rejected a package containing a Huawei phone being sent to the U.S. from the U.K., a claim China rebuffed.\--With assistance from John O'Neil and Josh Wingrove.To contact the reporter on this story: Jenny Leonard in Washington at jleonard67@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Brendan Murray at brmurray@bloomberg.net, ;Margaret Collins at mcollins45@bloomberg.net, Sarah McGregorFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Russia investigated disappearance of suspected US spy as possible murder Posted: 10 Sep 2019 02:16 PM PDT  Oleg Smolenkov hadn't been seen after he went on holiday in 2017, but Russian authorities concluded he had fled abroadThe Kremlin in Moscow in 2018. Photograph: Mladen Antonov/AFP/Getty ImagesThe CIA Russian spy drama currently gripping Washington has taken a new turn as Russian media reported that a suspected US mole inside the Kremlin was a member of Vladimir Putin's administration who disappeared in 2017 and was initially thought to have been murdered.Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, confirmed the man, Oleg Smolenkov, had worked for the Kremlin but played down his importance, insisting he was a low-level employee who had been fired two years ago.The Russian news site Daily Storm reported in September 2017 that Smolenkov, who had once worked in the Russian embassy in Washington, had not been seen since he went on holiday with his wife and three children to Montenegro in June of that year. The Russian authorities first investigated the disappearance as a possible murder but then became convinced that Smolenkov was still alive and living abroad.On Monday night, the New York Times and Washington Post confirmed a CNN report that a US agent inside the Kremlin had been spirited out to the US after concerns about his safety, but they did not name the spy.The US reports said that the agent had worked for US intelligence for more than a decade and reached a senior level with access to Putin himself. According to CNN, he had even provided pictures of documents on Putin's desk.But there were different versions of the motivation for the emergency "exfiltration". One source told CNN that the decision was driven partly by Donald Trump's divulging classified information to Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, and Russian ambassador, Sergey Kislyak, in an Oval Office meeting on 10 May 2017, a month before the exfiltration.Trump had fired the FBI director, James Comey, the previous day at a time when the bureau was the midst of an investigation into Russian interference in the 2106 presidential election. The New York Times and Washington Post, however, quoted sources as saying that the agent was persuaded to leave Russia amid increased scrutiny by Kremlin officials after US intelligence agencies revealed what they knew about Russian election interference, and in particular, Putin's role in it.Peskov dismissed the US reporting as "pulp fiction".The Kremlin spokesman said he could not confirm that Smolenkov was the longtime American agent referred into in the US reports. Speaking on Tuesday, Peskov said Smolenkov had no "contacts" with Putin, and was removed from his government post in 2016 or 2017."Smolenkov worked for the presidential executive office but he was discharged in line with an internal directive several years ago," Peskov said in Moscow. "I do not know whether he was an agent or not. The only thing I can tell you there was such an employee in the administration. He was dismissed."Peskov also downplayed the accounts of an extraordinary operation in 2017 to exfiltrate the US asset from Moscow. "All this discussion by American media about who was urgently evacuated, who was saved from whom and so on are in the genre of pulp fiction," said Peskov. "So let's leave it up to them."Peskov refused to be drawn on Smolenkov's current whereabouts. "We are not engaged in tracing people. I can only say in this case that there really was such an employee of the administration, and that he was fired several years ago," he said.Smolenkov is reported to have worked at the US embassy in Washington under the ambassador Yuri Ushakov. He then followed the ambassador back to Moscow in 2008, when Ushakov was appointed Putin's foreign policy adviser. Putin served as prime minister from 2008 until 2012, when he returned to the Kremlin for a third presidential term.Kommersant, a Russian business daily, cited former colleagues as saying that, contrary to Peskov's denials, Smolenkov did have direct access to Putin. "This is serious," an unnamed official said. Another said that it was unlikely Smolenkov had sight of secret material of value to the US intelligence services.According to the New York Times, the CIA first tried in late 2016 to extract the source from Moscow. The informant at first refused, citing family concerns – prompting doubts about his trustworthiness, and unhappiness inside CIA headquarters. The source finally agreed to flee months later, as the story of Russia's clandestine support for Trump dominated the headline, the paper said.Smolenkov vanished on 14 June 2017, from his family home in Kargopolskaya Street, in a northern suburb of Moscow, Russian media reported. He flew with his wife Antonina, a civil servant, and their children – girls aged two and seven, and a 13-year-old son – to Montenegro. The family did not return and switched off their social media accounts.With Smolenkov nowhere to be found, in September 2017 Russian authorities opened a criminal investigation into his suspected murder. Russia's FSB spy agency eventually dropped the case after concluding that the missing government official was still alive, the Daily Storm reported.The source appears to have settled in the US, in a comfortable house on the outskirts of Washington. In June 2018 the Washington Post's real estate section listed the purchase of a six-bedroom home in Stafford, Virginia, by Antonina Smolenkov and one Oleg "Smokenkov". The property cost $925,000. The difference in spellings appears to be a mistake.CNN reported that the difficult decision to remove the US's Moscow mole was made after President Trump divulged top secret information in May 2017 to Sergei Lavrov, Russia's veteran foreign minister. The White House has rubbished such claims. On Tuesday, Mike Pompeo – the US secretary of state and former CIA head – said: "Suffice it to say that the reporting there is factually wrong," without specifying exactly what he was disputing.The source's removal would have dealt a significant blow to the US's ability to understand top-level Kremlin decision making. The Russian government – largely made up of former KGB officers, now in their mid-60s – is paranoid about western spies.Former diplomats say the chaotic nature of Russia in the 1990s under Boris Yeltsin made it a fertile time for recruiting Russian assets. One of those hired by MI6 during this period was Sergei Skripal, who the British say was targeted for murder by two Russian assasins.
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| Trump ousts top adviser John Bolton: 'I disagreed strongly with him' Posted: 10 Sep 2019 02:14 PM PDT  * Trump to name new national security adviser next week * Bolton took hawkish positions on major foreign policy issues * Bolton fired as Trump's national security adviser – live updatesDonald Trump with John Bolton. Trump said on Twitter: 'I informed John Bolton last night that his services are no longer needed.' Photograph: The Washington Post/Getty ImagesDonald Trump has fired his national security adviser, John Bolton, in a pair of tweets in which he laid bare searing internal divisions within his inner circle, saying he had "disagreed strongly" with his top aide.The departure of such a resolute hawk raises the possibility that Trump's foreign policy could now make a dovish turn in the run up to next year's elections, in particular with respect to Iran.The president's firing of his third national security adviser in as many years appears to have caught even the White House by surprise. The explosive tweets were posted barely an hour after it was announced that Bolton would be appearing at a press conference alongside the secretaries of state and treasury.Bolton himself added to the confusion, commenting minutes after his public dismissal that he had offered to resign on Monday night but that Trump had replied: "Let's talk about it tomorrow."Bolton continued to press his case that he had resigned rather than being fired. He sent out a battery of texts including to Fox News presenters on air as well as the Washington Post, protesting: "I resigned, having offered to do so last night."Bolton's resignation letter was terse in the extreme."I hereby resign, effective immediately, as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. Thank you for affording me this opportunity to serve our country," the two-line note said.The sacking-cum-resignation of the lavishly mustachioed Bolton, an ultra-hawk on foreign policy who under George Bush was a key architect of the invasion of Iraq in 2003, brings to a head mounting tensions within Trump's top team of national security and foreign policy strategists.His removal had been a long time coming, with Trump making little effort to disguise his dissatisfaction over many months.According to the New York Times, Bolton had refused to appear on television talk shows on 25 August after the G7 summit in Biarritz so he did not have defend the president's views on RussiaThe two men agreed on some issues, like scrapping multilateral agreements such as the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran and tearing up the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty with Russia.But Trump's maverick approach to dealing with tough men and adversaries, in which he has emphasized a willingness to deal directly with America's traditional enemies, such as Vladimir Putin in Russia, Kim Jong-un in North Korea – and most recently the Taliban in Afghanistan – was increasingly at odds with Bolton's hardline belief that US military might is right.Bolton was also reported to have a testy relationship with the US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo. The two officials are said to have been at loggerheads for months to the extent that in recent days they were not speaking other than at official engagements."There were definitely places that Ambassador Bolton and I had different views about how we should proceed," Pompeo said yesterday. Asked if he had been taken unawares by the development, the secretary of state smiled and said: "I'm never surprised."Bolton also appears to have alienated Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, for his refusal to promote presidential policies he did not agree with."It was in Bolton's nature to run an imperial NSC [national security council] but he stepped on the toes of too many people," said Mark Groombridge, who worked for Bolton for a decade. "He got into the crosshairs of Pompeo and Mulvaney, who saw Bolton as a liability for the 2020 election. War on every front was not what Trump ran on."Trump was unusually candid about the rift within his own inner team. In the tweets he posted on Tuesday announcing Bolton's departure he wrote: "I informed John Bolton last night that his services are no longer needed at the White House. I disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions, as did others in the Administration, and therefore I asked John for his resignation, which was given to me this morning."Trump said he would announce his pick for his fourth national security adviser next week, and early speculation on candidates pointed to the ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, Iran envoy Brian Hook and Robert Blair, an aide to Mulvaney.An adviser to Iran's president, Hassan Rouhani, said Bolton's departure underlined the failure of Washington's "maximum pressure strategy" against Iran."The marginalisation and subsequent elimination of Bolton is not an accident but a decisive sign of the failure of the US maximum pressure strategy in the face of the constructive resistance of Iran," Hesameddin Ashena tweeted.Bolton's departure could open the way to fresh diplomacy with Iran. Trump has repeatedly said he is prepared to meet Rouhani, at the urging of France's president, Emmanuel Macron.Asked on Tuesday if he could foresee such a meeting at the UN general assembly later this month, Pompeo replied: "Sure."Commentators interpreted the news as further evidence of chaos and confusion within Trump's White House, but there were also loud sighs of relief from those who were delighted to see such a hawkish influence excised from the heart of government.Elizabeth Warren, a leading contender for the Democratic presidential nomination, agreed, saying: "The American people are better off with John Bolton out of the White House."Her rival, Bernie Sanders tweeted: "A symptom of the problem is gone. The root cause of authoritarianism remains."The National Iranian American Council, the largest body of US-Iranians, heralded the decision as the best of Trump's presidency, saying in a statement: "This single move dramatically reduces the chances of a new, catastrophic war in the Middle East."In contrast, the Republican senator Lindsey Graham praised Bolton on Twitter for "always pursuing an agenda that not only helps the President but makes America safe".Trump appointed Bolton in March 2018, having been impressed by the former US ambassador to the UN's performances as a commentator on Fox News, where he advocated a first strike on North Korea and pushed for regime change in Tehran.The tension between such a militaristic stance and Trump's hesitancy about being drawn into another major conflict broke into public view this summer as Bolton was increasingly pushed into the shadows. The division was plain to see when Trump made a surprise visit in June to meet Kim, without his adviser.In March 2018 John Bolton, a longtime foreign policy hawk, was named as Trump's third national security adviser in just 14 months. Over a three-decade career in foreign policy, he has advocated frequent use of military force and disdained diplomacy and international institutions.Before joining the Trump administration, he was best known for a brief stint as president George W Bush's ambassador to the United Nations – a body he openly sneered at. His role came to an end because the Senate would not confirm him.Bolton has called for bombing both North Korea and Iran. Less than a month before his appointment by Trump, he penned a Wall Street Journal op-ed making "the legal case for striking North Korea first".He seems to have played a key role in the collapse of the second Trump summit with Kim Jong-un in February, when he appeared to have drafted a maximalist list of demands for all-or-nothing disarmament that was presented to the North Korean dictator in Hanoi. A year of diplomacy ground to a halt with Kim, who had been expecting a more gradualist approachBolton was a harsh critic of the Iran nuclear deal, which Trump pulled out of, and went further, advocating military force against the country. A bombing campaign was the only way to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, he wrote in another op-ed.Bolton has seized the initiative in the fast-moving escalation of tensions with Tehran during 2019, spinning military deployments in the Gulf that were already in the pipeline as confrontational steps against Tehran, and reportedly irritating some in the Pentagon and intelligence agencies by putting a sensationalist spin on intelligence about Iranian military movements.In the standoff in Venezuela, Bolton was again centre stage, making himself the lead US voice for a failed effort at regime change in Venezuela in late April, producing a personal video appeal calling – in vain – on Nicolás Maduro's top aides to defect. Behind the scenes he has urged a reluctant US Southern Command to come up with ever more aggressive solutions to Maduro's hold on power.In the past he has also opposed the International Criminal Court in the Hague. As undersecretary of state under George W Bush, he travelled around the world negotiating two-way agreements in which countries pledged not to send US officials to the court. He also forcefully opposed the UN security council referring suspected genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan to the court, though the United States ultimately sat out that vote and the referral went forward.Bolton grew up in a working-class Republican family in Baltimore, and his first political experience was as a volunteer in the doomed 1964 campaign of Barry Goldwater, a staunch conservative from Arizona. He attended Yale University. Unlike many of his fellow students, he fiercely supported the war effort in Vietnam, but not to the point of taking part himself. He avoided the draft by joining the Maryland national guard. Bolton held senior positions in the administrations of Ronald Reagan and the elder George Bush, and wrote a book summing up his views: Surrender Is Not An Option.He is derided by critics as a warmonger, but defines his own philosophy as "Americanist" – a close cousin to Trump's "America First" slogan – and is no fan of traditional carrot and stick diplomacy. "I don't do carrots," he has said.Trump announced on 10 September 2019 that he had fired Bolton, tweeting that "I disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions, as did others in the Administration".In June Trump came close to ordering airstrikes on Iran in response to the shooting down of a US surveillance drone but stood the mission down at the eleventh hour. That was a blow to Bolton, who had been the keenest advocate of an airstrike.Over the months Trump began goading Bolton over his hawkish position in front of other officials and even visiting heads of state. According to Axios, he once said in the Oval Office: "John has never seen a war he doesn't like."But the trigger to Tuesday's changing of the guard appears to have been Afghanistan. Bolton was openly unconvinced by efforts by Trump and Pompeo to do a deal with the Taliban as part of the plan to withdraw US troops from the country.Trump had been prepared to go as far as to invite Taliban leaders to Camp David just ahead of the 18th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. The talks were cancelled at the last minute – but by then the gulf between the president and his aide had become unbridgeable.
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| The Latest: Trump dismisses national security adviser Bolton Posted: 10 Sep 2019 01:57 PM PDT  President Donald Trump has abruptly forced out John Bolton, the hawkish national security adviser with whom he had strong disagreements on Iran, Afghanistan and a cascade of other global challenges. The sudden shakeup marks the latest departure of a prominent voice of dissent from the president's inner circle, as Trump has grown less accepting of advice contrary to his instincts.
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| US says reports of CIA mole in Kremlin put lives at risk Posted: 10 Sep 2019 01:52 PM PDT  US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday angrily denounced news reports detailing the secret exfiltration of a CIA mole who had operated at the top levels of the Kremlin, saying such reports could put lives at risk. The informant reportedly confirmed to US intelligence that President Vladimir Putin directed Russia's meddling in the 2016 US presidential election, straining superpower relations and casting a cloud over Donald Trump's stunning victory.
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| Netanyahu vows to begin annexing West Bank settlements Posted: 10 Sep 2019 01:25 PM PDT  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Tuesday to annex the heart of the West Bank if he wins re-election next week, a move that could inflame the Middle East and extinguish any remaining Palestinian hope of establishing a separate state. Arab leaders angrily condemned Netanyahu's remarks, and a U.N. spokesman warned the step would be "devastating" to the prospects for a two-state solution. Netanyahu said he would extend Israeli sovereignty over the Jordan Valley — an area seen as the breadbasket of any Palestinian state — shortly after forming a new government and would move later to annex other Jewish settlements.
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| Donald Trump 'fires' national security adviser John Bolton over policy disagreements Posted: 10 Sep 2019 01:21 PM PDT  Donald Trump announced by tweet that he fired his national security adviser John Bolton on Tuesday, citing "strong" disagreements with his proposals. The pair had recently clashed over Afghanistan policy, with Mr Bolton opposing a plan to invite the Taliban to Camp David for peace talks that was later scraped. Mr Bolton also reportedly objected to Mr Trump meeting Hassan Rouhani, the Iranian president, and was sceptical that North Korea would give up its nuclear weapons. Mr Trump broke the news on Twitter, writing: "I informed John Bolton last night that his services are no longer needed at the White House. "I disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions, as did others in the administration, and therefore I asked John for his resignation, which was given to me this morning." John Bolton at the White House earlier on Tuesday Credit: Tom Brenner/Bloomberg However Mr Bolton swiftly offered a different version of events, tweeting: "I offered to resign last night and President Trump said, 'Let's talk about it tomorrow'." The departure means Mr Trump is now looking for his fourth White House national security advisor in less than three years. The president said a permanent replacement would be announced next week. Mr Bolton, 70, took the job back in April 2018 with a reputation as a renowned foreign policy hawk, having served as George W Bush's UN ambassador. Over recent months there had been widespread speculation that his opposition to many of Mr Trump's foreign policy instincts, and willingness to voice them, had begun to frustrate the president. Mike Pompeo, the US secretary of state who is close to Mr Trump and was also said to have frequently clashed with Mr Bolton, did little to hide the differences on Tuesday. Profile | John Bolton, the hawk who clashed with Trump one too many times "The president is entitled to the staff that he wants, at any moment," Mr Pompeo said at a briefing in the White House which Mr Bolton was meant also to have been attending. "He should have people that he trusts and values and whose efforts and judgments benefit him in delivering American foreign policy." Asked if he had clashed with Mr Bolton, Mr Pompeo said: "There were many times Ambassador Bolton and I disagreed. That's to be sure." Hogan Gidley, a White House spokesman, also used a similar line to explain the departure, saying that Mr Bolton's "priorities and policies just don't line up with the president". I informed John Bolton last night that his services are no longer needed at the White House. I disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions, as did others in the Administration, and therefore....— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 10, 2019 One area where Mr Bolton and Mr Trump disagreed, and which was on Tuesday being cited as a tipping point in their relationship, was over Afghanistan policy. Mr Bolton was reportedly opposed to Mr Trump's plan to bring Taliban leaders and the Afghan president to Camp David for peace talks on Sunday. The president revealed the secret plans on Saturday while also announcing that the meeting had been cancelled after a US soldier was killed in Afghanistan. Critics questioned why Mr Trump would have hosted Taliban leaders on US soil just three days before the anniversary of the September 11 attacks, which killed almost 3,000 Americans in 2001. I offered to resign last night and President Trump said, "Let's talk about it tomorrow."— John Bolton (@AmbJohnBolton) September 10, 2019 Mr Bolton served under Mr Bush, who was US president when the atrocity took place. On Tuesday morning Mr Bolton tweeted about the importance of remembering the "horrific" attack. A clash over whether to sign a peace deal with the Taliban, and the need to deliver Mr Trump's promise to bring US troops back from Afghanistan, was not the only area of disagreement. Mr Bolton was sceptical of the chances of North Korea agreeing to denuclearise, despite Mr Trump's public optimism and warm words for Kim Jong-un, the country's leader. Ousted | The 'no men' who Trump has let go He said recent North Korean missile tests violated UN resolutions, which the president has contradicted, and did not join Mr Trump for his meeting with Kim in the Korean Demilitarized Zone [DMZ] in June. Iran was another area of differing views. Mr Bolton was said to have supported an air strike after Tehran shot down a US drone over the summer. Mr Trump backed out of the military intervention at the last minute. Mr Pompeo said on Tuesday that Mr Trump may meet Mr Rouhani at the UN general assembly in New York later this month - a sign of a possible softening in America's hardline approach. Mr Trump offered a glimpse into his differing opinions with Mr Bolton back in May, joking that he "tempers" his adviser and noting other aides were "a little more dovish". John Bolton, left, was said to have clashed on policy with Mike Pompeo, centre, the US Secretary of State, as well as Donald Trump, right Credit: AP Photo/Andrew Harnik Mr Bolton's departure means that a fully committed Brexiteer is leaving Mr Trump's inner circle, which could influence the president's thinking on the issue. Mr Bolton met Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister, and Sajid Javid, the Chancellor, on a recent trip to Britain during which he said America would "enthusiastically" support a no deal Brexit. Mr Bolton doubled down on his insistence that he resigned, according to a text message he sent a reporter at The Washington Post. It read: "Let's be clear, I resigned, having offered to do so last night. I will have my say in due course. But I have given you the facts on the resignation. My sole concern is US national security." Charlie Kupperman, Mr Bolton's deputy, will fill the national security adviser role on a temporary basis. US media speculated that Brian Hook and Stephen Biegun, the top State Department advisers on Iran and North Korea respectively, could be considered as the permanent replacement.
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| NEWSMAKER-Bolton was odd choice for Trump's foreign policy team Posted: 10 Sep 2019 01:01 PM PDT ![NEWSMAKER-Bolton was odd choice for Trump's foreign policy team]( "NEWSMAKER-Bolton was odd choice for Trump's foreign policy team") John Bolton was always an odd fit to be U.S. President Donald Trump's national security adviser: a conservative hawk who advocated for regime change in North Korea and Iran, supported the Iraq war and favored a tough stance toward Russia. The mustachioed hard-liner's efforts to add bite to the bark of U.S. foreign policy met stiff resistance from a White House leery of foreign entanglements and came to an abrupt halt on Tuesday when Trump announced he had fired him. Trump said he and others in the administration had disagreed strongly with many of Bolton's suggestions.
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| To Win Re-Election, Bibi Netanyahu Is Waging ‘Wars’ at Home and Abroad Posted: 10 Sep 2019 12:53 PM PDT  Oded Balilty/GettyTEL AVIV—Benjamin Netanyahu is firing in all directions these days. Facing a tight re-election bid next Tuesday, the long-serving Israeli prime minister has just in the last two weeks launched air strikes against multiple neighboring Middle Eastern countries, pushed back against a potential U.S.-Iran détente, attacked the local media and his own Arab citizens, and called into question the legitimacy of the entire electoral process.After the Netanyahu Fail, What Is Trump's Israel-Palestine Solution? Let Others Pick Up the PiecesIn a bid for every last right-wing vote, on Tuesday Netanyahu again promised to annex wide swaths of the West Bank if he were re-elected—a move that if implemented could spell the end of any two-state solution with the Palestinians and, with it, the end of Israel as both a democratic and Jewish state.The impression is either of a master strategist in complete control, pulling multiple political, military and diplomatic strings both here and abroad; or, alternatively, a hysterical politician in the twilight of his reign doing everything within his ample powers to maintain a grip on power. There is, of course, the likelihood that it's both. The military dimension to Netanyahu's recent offensive is arguably the most consequential precisely because it's so out of character. Despite his hardline international reputation, Netanyahu is extremely cautious when it comes to the use of force. Yet, in the span of 24 hours late last month, Israeli aircraft reportedly struck Iranian-affiliated targets in Syria, Lebanon and Iraq. In recent years Israel has admitted openly to launching hundreds of strikes inside Syria to forestall what officials here call Iran's "military entrenchment" in its war-torn neighbor: Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps personnel, Shiite militia fighters, and advanced weaponry like precision guided missiles. Such Israeli military action—officially termed the "campaign between wars," since it's intended to shear Iranian power ahead of any wider conflict—has now extended into Lebanon and Iraq. How do we know this? Because Netanyahu confirmed it. "I'm doing everything to protect the security of our country from all directions—from the north against Lebanon and [the pro-Iranian militia] Hezbollah, in Syria against Iran and Hezbollah, and unfortunately also in Iraq against Iran," Netanyahu said on August 30 during a Facebook live chat with supporters, days after the reported strikes in those three countries.A "senior Israeli defense source," likely Netanyahu himself (who currently also doubles as defense minister), repeated similar claims a few days later to local military reporters. Indeed, the Israeli military has been extremely expansive in recent weeks detailing Iran's efforts to arm Hezbollah with precision guided missiles on Lebanese soil. A drone attack in Beirut, in the heart of Hezbollah's Dahiyeh stronghold, reportedly targeted high-value equipment meant to upgrade the Lebanese militia's arsenal. Here, too, the military briefed reporters on the exact details of what allegedly was hit. This was all a sharp break from Israel's usual policy of "purposeful ambiguity," wherein it declines to take responsibility when something mysteriously blows up across the border—thus sparing its enemies' blushes so as to avoid pushing them towards a response. (A limited response ultimately did come on September 1 in the form of a cross-border Hezbollah attack on an Israeli army jeep.) To be clear: not even Netanyahu's harshest domestic critics allege that, mere weeks before an election, he's purposefully pushing the country into war. As The Daily Beast reported in February, there is widespread consensus that Iranian proxies armed with upgraded precision guided missiles are a severe threat to the country's security, now deemed second only to Iran's possible pursuit of a nuclear weapon. Most Netanyahu critics even accept the official position that the timing for these strikes was due to Iran's escalating efforts in this area (primarily recent inroads in Iraq and Lebanon). What they do take issue with, however, is Netanyahu's non-stop public rhetoric after the fact—verging on a Middle Eastern "end zone dance" in the face of Iran and Hezbollah—that could lead to deadlier follow-up attacks and a wider conflagration. Israel until recently used to speak softly and carry a big stick, which it deployed to great effect against Iran and its regional proxies. Netanyahu is now publicly trading insults with Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah and IRGC Gen. Qassem Soleimani, who have vowed to respond in kind. Netanyahu's chief rival, Benny Gantz, head of the Blue and White party, has strongly supported the government's regional policy against Iran. Yet even he called into question the increasing "talk and breaking of the [prior] ambiguity," saying Netanyahu is trying to "score political points" off of the national security debate.Ron Ben-Yishai, the dean of Israel's military correspondents going back five decades, told The Daily Beast that even a prime minister-cum-defense minister doesn't plan operations, the motivating force for which is usually the military and Mossad, Israel's foreign intelligence agency. Netanyahu, Ben-Yishai said, "wouldn't launch an operation because of an election, and the army chief of staff isn't a servant of any prime minister… but the talk [surrounding it] is without doubt political." The danger of all this talk, Ben-Yishai added, is that it's like "poking [Iran in] the eye. Especially in the Middle East, the issue of honor could lead to a response." Nevertheless, after years burnishing his reputation as Israel's "Mr. Security," an election campaign dominated by military crises could help Netanyahu with his base and the many undecided voters. But part of the audience for all this mounting "blather," as some have termed it, may in fact be farther afield. The same weekend that Israel was bombing across the Levant, President Donald Trump was at the G-7 summit in France, where he indicated a willingness to meet with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani to resolve the impasse over Iran's nuclear program. A short while after Trump made positive comments about Iran, Netanyahu issued a video where he reminded the world (including, presumably, the U.S. president) of where he stood on the issue. "Iran is working on a broad front to carry out murderous terrorist attacks against the State of Israel," Netanyahu said. "Israel will continue to defend its security however that may be necessary. I call on the international community to act immediately so that Iran halts these attacks."As Axios reported, Netanyahu was unable to reach Trump by telephone during the G-7 summit. In the following days the Israeli prime minister had calls with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Vice President Mike Pence – but tellingly not with Trump.A snap visit to London last week, primarily to meet with U.S. Secretary of Defense Mark Esper, likely failed to console the Israeli leader."Iran," Esper said, "was inching toward that place where we could have talks." Senior British officials with whom Netanyahu met were also inclined to support a French-led diplomatic process. Israeli defense officials reportedly are convinced that a Trump-Rouhani summit is now a "done deal." Trump on Tuesday reiterated his openness to meeting with the Iranian leader, despite Netanyahu just hours earlier revealing what he claimed was a secret Iranian nuclear weapons facility (another cynical use, many Israeli analysts observed, of sensitive intelligence for political gain.) Earlier on Tuesday, Trump fired his ultra-hawkish national security advisor, John Bolton, saying he "disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions." A lot is riding on whether Netanyahu can maintain U.S. support for his hard line against Iran and its proxies—not least his own political future. Israelis will again go to the polls on September 17 after Netanyahu failed to form a government in the wake of the original April ballot. According to the polls, Netanyahu is once more in a very tight race for re-election. He has in recent weeks seemingly stopped at nothing to ensure that his now 10-year reign (thirteen overall dating back to the 1990s) continues. Massive banners of Netanyahu and Trump shaking hands adorn tall office buildings and billboards across the country, underlining the premier's close relationship with the U.S. president and his overall image as a global statesman (including taking credit for the American withdrawal from the Obama-era nuclear deal). Both points would be severely undercut if there were, in fact, a U.S.-Iran rapprochement. Just as he's attacked Iran across the region, Netanyahu with equal vigor has gone after his perceived domestic enemies. He has called for a boycott of the country's most popular television station—Channel 12—because it has deigned to publish extensive leaks from inside the myriad investigations of Netanyahu's alleged corruption. "A terror attack against democracy," the prime minister termed it. The channel's legal correspondent, Guy Peleg, now travels with bodyguards.More perniciously, in a Trumpian twist, Netanyahu in the last week has railed constantly against voter fraud among Israel's Arab minority, alleging that irregularities in this demographic cost him and his right-wing allies victory in April. "The problem of fraud and theft of the elections is real. We will not allow the coming elections to be stolen," Netanyahu said, priming his supporters to reject the outcome of next week's poll if it doesn't go their way. No matter that the Central Elections Committee, police, attorney general, and other neutral observers say no such fraud actually took place and reject Netanyahu's demand that cameras be placed in polling stations. Israeli President Reuven Rivlin called the allegations "unsubstantiated and even irresponsible political attacks" intended to "undermine public trust in these [electoral] bodies."It seems that Netanyahu is willing to attack the very foundations of Israeli democracy, and again incite against the country's Arab minority in order to galvanize his nationalist base. It's a well-worn tactic Netanyahu has deployed in the past—the so-called Gevalt campaign, Yiddish for "alarm." "Gevalt is always real and Netanyahu is a panicker to begin with, which is probably what makes him so effective [as a politician]," Tal Shalev, Walla News' chief political correspondent, told The Daily Beast. "He's never calm." Yet Shalev, a keen Netanyahu-watcher who traveled with him to London, said that despite the public hysteria purposefully sown, the prime minister seemed calm, confident and in a good mood in recent days. There's a contrast between what he's broadcasting to those around him and what he's saying publicly, she added. "But he's acting a bit more ruthless than usual now, and breaking all the rules, due to the situation he's in. It's a battle for the rest of his life." Without his right-wing bloc of parties winning an outright majority of 61 seats in the Knesset, Netanyahu could be finished politically—and then there are his looming corruption indictments, with a pre-trial hearing set for early next month. A former ally on the right, Avigdor Lieberman, has turned against him, forcing the repeat election in the first place and now demanding a national unity government with Blue and White—which the latter refuse to countenance so long as the legally compromised Netanyahu still heads the Likud party. The political machinations after September 17 could be even more extreme than the election campaign itself. Yet there's another possibility, perhaps even more likely, that against all the odds, and all these enemies—some real, most manufactured—Netanyahu actually wins outright. The polls aren't looking favorable, but it's important to recall that in the April ballot, a small right-wing faction was only 1400 votes short (out of 4 million cast) of entering parliament and thereby giving Netanyahu his majority. Last time, too, the right-wing essentially threw away six to eight seats via parties that didn't pass the electoral threshold, a scenario now mitigated by a recent Netanyahu pact with a far-right faction that pulled out of the election.Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar Barred From Israel—But a Conflagration Is ComingA source in Blue and White told The Daily Beast that the current polls, both public and internal, were very consistent—a Netanyahu victory isn't a done deal. "This is going to be close, and will come down to the last few days," he vowed. With the margins so fine, Netanyahu is pushing Israel to the very edge. Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Netanyahu vows to annex West Bank's Jordan Valley if re-elected Posted: 10 Sep 2019 12:53 PM PDT  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a deeply controversial pledge Tuesday to annex the Jordan Valley in the occupied West Bank if re-elected in September 17 polls. Palestinians immediately reacted by saying Netanyahu was destroying any prospects for peace, while his electoral opponents accused him of a cynical play for right-wing nationalist votes with polls only a week away. The United Nations said such a move would have no "international legal impact", while Turkey condemned it as "racist".
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| Without Bolton, Trump Can Now Go Soft on Iran Posted: 10 Sep 2019 12:50 PM PDT ![Without Bolton, Trump Can Now Go Soft on Iran]( "Without Bolton, Trump Can Now Go Soft on Iran") (Bloomberg Opinion) -- President Donald Trump's decision to part ways with his national security adviser, John Bolton, was overdetermined. They disagreed on Afghanistan. They differed on North Korea. There was tension between them over Venezuela. They couldn't even agree on whether Bolton quit or was fired.Their most significant dispute, however, was on Iran. Bolton favored completely abandoning the 2015 nuclear deal negotiated under former President Barack Obama and pressed for maximum pressure on Iran's leaders. Along with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Bolton helped persuade Trump earlier this year to retain a U.S. military presence in Syria to counter Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps.Trump has supported maximum pressure, but he has also flirted lately with diplomacy. At the Group of Seven meeting in France last month, the president pared down his administration's initial 12 conditions for lifting sanctions on Iran to just three. While he has always left the door open to talks, Trump has been musing about this idea more openly and more frequently. It nearly happened at the G-7, when Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif was invited to the summit by French President Emmanuel Macron. Bolton, senior U.S. officials told me, learned about his visit from the Israelis.The prospect of Trump meeting with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani came up at a news briefing Tuesday with Pompeo and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin. When asked if Trump could meet with Rouhani later this month at the U.N. General Assembly, Pompeo said: "Sure. The president has made it very clear: He is prepared to meet with no preconditions."To date, the Iranians have not agreed to any kind of meeting. Zarif has said the U.S. must lift sanctions before such a parley. Rouhani offered Obama — who pursued an accord with Iran throughout most of his presidency — only a brief phone call.Nonetheless, Bolton's exit could pave the way for the Trump dream of a U.S.-Iran summit. Zarif himself has made Bolton the centerpiece of his propaganda campaign. He blamed Bolton, but not Trump, for the increased tensions between his country and America, and Zarif's allies in Washington have already applauded the end of the Bolton era. On Tuesday, the president of the National Iranian American Council Tuesday praised Trump. "We congratulate President Donald Trump on what may become the best decision of his Presidency," said Jamal Abdi. "This single move dramatically reduces the chances of a new, catastrophic war in the Middle East."Trump has heard this argument from elements of the right as well. Fox News host Tucker Carlson ranted in June that Bolton was a "bureaucratic tapeworm." Republican senator Rand Paul has offered his services as a back channel to Iran to help establish negotiations.Of course it's preposterous to argue that Bolton, who served Trump for less than a year and a half, is responsible for U.S. tensions with a country that been attacking American citizens and soldiers for 40 years. The issue is what the U.S. should do about this state of hostilities.That's why Trump's frustrations with Bolton count as ironic. In 2017, the president held a series of meetings with Bolton to get his perspective on leaving the Iran nuclear deal — undercutting General H.R. McMaster, who was then serving as his national security adviser. McMaster wanted to keep the deal and pressure European allies to help renegotiate it and make it stronger.Now it appears that Trump has buyer's remorse. While he would never acknowledge it, Trump is basically pushing for a bargain very similar to the one that he criticized Obama for negotiating. Trump is free to appoint a national security adviser who shares his new position — and whoever takes the job will be safe until the president inevitably changes his mind.To contact the author of this story: Eli Lake at elake1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Michael Newman at mnewman43@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Eli Lake is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering national security and foreign policy. He was the senior national security correspondent for the Daily Beast and covered national security and intelligence for the Washington Times, the New York Sun and UPI.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Without Bolton, Trump Can Now Go Soft on Iran Posted: 10 Sep 2019 12:50 PM PDT ![Without Bolton, Trump Can Now Go Soft on Iran]( "Without Bolton, Trump Can Now Go Soft on Iran") (Bloomberg Opinion) -- President Donald Trump's decision to part ways with his national security adviser, John Bolton, was overdetermined. They disagreed on Afghanistan. They differed on North Korea. There was tension between them over Venezuela. They couldn't even agree on whether Bolton quit or was fired.Their most significant dispute, however, was on Iran. Bolton favored completely abandoning the 2015 nuclear deal negotiated under former President Barack Obama and pressed for maximum pressure on Iran's leaders. Along with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Bolton helped persuade Trump earlier this year to retain a U.S. military presence in Syria to counter Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps.Trump has supported maximum pressure, but he has also flirted lately with diplomacy. At the Group of Seven meeting in France last month, the president pared down his administration's initial 12 conditions for lifting sanctions on Iran to just three. While he has always left the door open to talks, Trump has been musing about this idea more openly and more frequently. It nearly happened at the G-7, when Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif was invited to the summit by French President Emmanuel Macron. Bolton, senior U.S. officials told me, learned about his visit from the Israelis.The prospect of Trump meeting with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani came up at a news briefing Tuesday with Pompeo and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin. When asked if Trump could meet with Rouhani later this month at the U.N. General Assembly, Pompeo said: "Sure. The president has made it very clear: He is prepared to meet with no preconditions."To date, the Iranians have not agreed to any kind of meeting. Zarif has said the U.S. must lift sanctions before such a parley. Rouhani offered Obama — who pursued an accord with Iran throughout most of his presidency — only a brief phone call.Nonetheless, Bolton's exit could pave the way for the Trump dream of a U.S.-Iran summit. Zarif himself has made Bolton the centerpiece of his propaganda campaign. He blamed Bolton, but not Trump, for the increased tensions between his country and America, and Zarif's allies in Washington have already applauded the end of the Bolton era. On Tuesday, the president of the National Iranian American Council Tuesday praised Trump. "We congratulate President Donald Trump on what may become the best decision of his Presidency," said Jamal Abdi. "This single move dramatically reduces the chances of a new, catastrophic war in the Middle East."Trump has heard this argument from elements of the right as well. Fox News host Tucker Carlson ranted in June that Bolton was a "bureaucratic tapeworm." Republican senator Rand Paul has offered his services as a back channel to Iran to help establish negotiations.Of course it's preposterous to argue that Bolton, who served Trump for less than a year and a half, is responsible for U.S. tensions with a country that been attacking American citizens and soldiers for 40 years. The issue is what the U.S. should do about this state of hostilities.That's why Trump's frustrations with Bolton count as ironic. In 2017, the president held a series of meetings with Bolton to get his perspective on leaving the Iran nuclear deal — undercutting General H.R. McMaster, who was then serving as his national security adviser. McMaster wanted to keep the deal and pressure European allies to help renegotiate it and make it stronger.Now it appears that Trump has buyer's remorse. While he would never acknowledge it, Trump is basically pushing for a bargain very similar to the one that he criticized Obama for negotiating. Trump is free to appoint a national security adviser who shares his new position — and whoever takes the job will be safe until the president inevitably changes his mind.To contact the author of this story: Eli Lake at elake1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Michael Newman at mnewman43@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Eli Lake is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering national security and foreign policy. He was the senior national security correspondent for the Daily Beast and covered national security and intelligence for the Washington Times, the New York Sun and UPI.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Trump wants to build a legacy, Bolton to break things – something had to give Posted: 10 Sep 2019 12:45 PM PDT  No one expected Trump to pivot to diplomatic breakthroughs with someone as bellicose as Bolton by his sideJohn Bolton and Donald Trump in the cabinet room at the White House in April 2018. Photograph: Carlos Barría/ReutersJohn Bolton can at least boast that he lasted longer than his two predecessors, but few observers of Trumpworld expected him to cling on until 2020.Donald Trump hired Bolton to break things, like the Obama administration legacy and the orthodox foreign policy establishment in general. Now, with the 2020 election coming, a downturn looming and a second presidential term in doubt, Trump is trying to build a foreign policy legacy of his own – or at least a reasonable impression of one.For the president, that involves shaking hands with adversaries and announcing diplomatic breakthroughs with the likes of Tehran and the Taliban. Almost no one expected him to be able to make that hairpin pivot with someone as bellicose and determined as Bolton at his side.The abrupt departure of the US national security adviser comes just three days after it emerged that Trump had invited the Taliban to Camp David to finalise a deal. The scene, in the same week as the 18th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, was like an outtake from Bolton's worst nightmare.It was quickly reported that Bolton, an inveterate hawk, had vigorously opposed the move, and according to one version, the two old men argued bitterly over the issue. Bolton is an accomplished bureaucratic infighter, and his views usually find their way to the press.In the end, the Camp David encounter did not happen (either because of the Taliban attack in Kabul on Thursday, or because the Taliban refused to attend, depending on who you believe), but Bolton's dissension was public – certainly not for the first time, and it would not have been the last. There are other hostile foreigners Trump would like to shake hands with before the election campaign gets going.France's president, Emmanuel Macron, is currently pushing Trump into meeting the Iranian president, Hassan Rouhani, at the UN this month, and Trump signaled he was open to the idea. He has suggested many times he believes he could make a quick new deal with Iran if he could meet the country's leadership face to face.Trump's model for such summitry is his relationship with Kim Jong-un, who he has met three times, a grand spectacle on each occasion, accompanied by announcements of breakthroughs without the reality of North Korean nuclear disarmament.Before entering the White House, Bolton had been derisive about diplomacy with Pyongyang. After being hired in March 2018, he initially seemed to make his peace with the Trump glad-handing style, but was clearly uncomfortable and had a hand in the derailment of the second summit in Hanoi. When Trump sought to resume the diplomacy, his proudest foreign policy achievement, with a meeting on the dividing line between the two Koreas in June, Bolton was nowhere to be seen. He had been sent on a diplomatic mission to Mongolia.The relationship suffered another bad blow over Bolton's handling of Venezuela. He was convinced at the end of April that the regime of Nicolás Maduro was about to fall, and he put US prestige wholeheartedly behind what later turned out to be a sketchily planned coup d'etat that depended on senior Maduro aides defecting. It failed, and Trump was reportedly furious."It is pretty clear that Trump has an agenda: meeting Rouhani, doing a deal with North Korea, doing a deal with the Taliban. On all of that, Bolton was a pretty major obstacle," said Thomas Wright, director of the Center on the US and Europe at the Brookings Institution.Trump had no compunction about humiliating Bolton. He would point to him in meetings with foreign leaders to make fun of him. "He wants me to go to war," he told one European head of state. "But I won't let him."It was for those very instincts, however, that Trump had appointed Bolton in the first place. The then president-elect had given Bolton an audition after winning the 2016 election but was uneasy about the bristling grey walrus moustache. He had a certain idea of how he wanted his top officials to appear, and Bolton did not look the part. It was also unlikely Bolton would get confirmed by the Senate. The chamber had previously blocked him for the post of US ambassador to the UN, fearing he was too extreme and undiplomatic, so George W Bush ultimately went around Congress and gave him a recess appointment.By spring 2018, Trump was getting restless and felt boxed in by the "axis of adults" who were stopping him walking out of the multilateral nuclear deal with Iran that Barack Obama had agreed to in 2015. Bolton was one of the few who hated the deal even more than Trump and was making his views plain on Fox News, which gave him a platform almost daily. He was also being pushed by one of Trump's biggest donors, casino magnate and Israel ultra-hawk Sheldon Adelson.Within two months of Trump hiring Bolton, the US was out of the deal and on the way to "maximum pressure" on Iran. The incoming national security adviser also convinced the president to withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty with Russia.Bolton's departure was unsurprisingly hailed by arms control groups on Tuesday as the best news they have had for years. But the celebrations are tinged with caution. Bolton has degraded the interagency process, the way the administration makes policy, largely by ignoring it. He did not bring the department heads together because he wanted to have Trump's ear alone."Bolton played an important role for Trump – he freed him from the bureaucratic constraints of a national security policy process by demolishing it. This is one reason he lasted so long," said Suzanne DiMaggio, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.Any successor will inherit this bureaucratic wasteland, with few, if any, checks on the commander-in-chief.The next national security adviser may steer in a more dovish, diplomatic direction, but he or she will still have Trump grabbing the wheel at whim. The best prediction is that for the foreseeable future, US foreign policy will continue to swerve violently from one extreme to another.
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| Oil's Problem Isn't Bolton Going, It's Trump Staying Posted: 10 Sep 2019 12:32 PM PDT  (Bloomberg Opinion) -- So, about John Bolton. To paraphrase another tragic character, nothing became the ex-national security adviser's tenure quite like the leaving it. Sudden, tweeted and disputed – an all-too-familiar three-act play in the theater of Trump.Oil had a little hiccup on Tuesday's news, dropping by roughly a buck a barrel. The uncharitable, if rather obvious, conclusion to draw is there was a Bolton premium of one princely dollar, which is rather disappointing from one perspective, I suppose. It is also too simplistic and rather misses the point.It's tempting to conclude, or at least speculate, that the departure of the highest-profile Iran hawk from President Donald Trump's administration signals a softer policy toward the country. That line of reasoning would suggest possibly higher Iranian oil exports. Given how important their absence has been to supporting oil prices, that would be a cue to sell.The truth is, though, we have no idea yet who will replace Bolton. Plus, while it was no secret he had clashed repeatedly with Trump on several fronts, the president's ambivalence toward Iran predates Bolton's arrival. Certainly, the current context of tightening sanctions – most recently against individuals and assets associated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps – creeping nuclear escalation and the occasional explosion around the Persian Gulf don't appear to portend peace breaking out.Rather than Bolton, the individual oil investors should worry about here is his ex-boss. Trump has just lost his third national security adviser. And Bolton, remarkably, has had the longest stint so far, despite not even making it to 18 months. Trump sprung this upon the world – and Bolton, too, if he is to be believed – with the usual twin-thumbed tact. Forget the dismissed man and focus on the incumbent agent of chaos.Recall that the drop in oil prices that ended 2018 had its roots in the president's head-fake about Iran last summer. Oil prices rose, as did production, including from Saudi Arabia, in expectation of imminent curtailment of Iranian exports. Then worries about the impact of higher pump prices on November midterms led to Trump issuing waivers for several importers of Iranian barrels. Oil's summer turned to fall with unseemly haste. Almost a year after the peak in 2018, who can say the oil market is on surer footing now? There's a certain pointlessness to debating the significance of Bolton's exit for oil because the one thing the market can rely on now is that it can't rely on anything. The U.S. has become a force for disruption, not stability.Beyond the intrigues of foreign policy, there's the impact of the ongoing trade war to consider. The International Oil Agency just cut its demand growth forecast for 2019 to one million barrels a day, which would be the weakest since 2014, when the oil crash began. Will China and the U.S. strike a deal? Your guess is as good as mine, but the important thing is that we're all just guessing at this point. If hostilities continue into 2020 and the threat of an election-year recession looms, then the one forecast we can probably count on, now that even the weather outlook is compromised, is a heightened chance of erratic behavior. And this is the real problem for oil, as well as the companies who produce it. There is just precious little incentive to hold oil futures or E&P stocks in an environment where demand looks shaky and the administration's positions even more so. To contact the author of this story: Liam Denning at ldenning1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Gongloff at mgongloff1@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Liam Denning is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering energy, mining and commodities. He previously was editor of the Wall Street Journal's Heard on the Street column and wrote for the Financial Times' Lex column. He was also an investment banker.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| UPDATE 2-Bolton's departure shows failure of U.S. 'maximum pressure' against Iran -Rouhani adviser Posted: 10 Sep 2019 12:20 PM PDT  An adviser to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Tuesday that U.S. President Donald Trump's firing of his national security adviser John Bolton pointed to the failure of Washington's "maximum pressure strategy" against Iran. "The marginalisation and subsequent elimination of Bolton is not an accident but a decisive sign of the failure of the U.S. maximum pressure strategy in the face of the constructive resistance of Iran," Hesameddin Ashena tweeted. Brian Hook, the U.S. special representative for Iran, said last week more sanctions against Iran were coming and the United States was committed to its campaign of "maximum pressure".
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| Pope to UK: Obey UN resolution to hand over Chagos Islands Posted: 10 Sep 2019 12:04 PM PDT  Pope Francis said Tuesday that Britain should obey a U.N. resolution and return to Mauritius a disputed Indian Ocean archipelago that hosts the U.S. military base at Diego Garcia. Francis cited Catholic doctrine in responding to a question about the Chagos Islands during an in-flight press conference as he flew home from a visit to three African countries, including Mauritius. Francis said when countries give international organizations such as the United Nations or international tribunals the right to adjudicate disputes, those decisions must be respected.
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| Trump ready to meet Iran leader with no conditions: Mnuchin Posted: 10 Sep 2019 12:02 PM PDT  President Donald Trump is ready to meet his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani without preconditions while maintaining "maximum pressure" on Tehran, US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said Tuesday. "Now the president has made clear, he is happy to take a meeting with no preconditions, but we are maintaining the maximum pressure campaign," Mnuchin said, just days after Iran said it had fired up centrifuges to boost its enriched uranium stockpiles. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, standing alongside Mnuchin in the White House briefing room, said "sure" when asked whether Trump could meet Rouhani later this month on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
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| The Latest: Israel says it intercepted 2 rockets from Gaza Posted: 10 Sep 2019 11:54 AM PDT  The Israeli military says that it intercepted two rockets launched from the Gaza Strip toward the southern city of Ashdod. The rocket fire interrupted a Likud party campaign rally where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was speaking. After being taken away by security guards, Netanyahu returned minutes later and continued addressing the crowd.
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| A look at John Bolton's tenure in Trump administration Posted: 10 Sep 2019 11:41 AM PDT  John Bolton's tenure as President Donald Trump's national security adviser included disagreements on several key policy issues, including relations with Iran and North Korea. During his year and a half at the White House, Bolton had particular success in shaping the administration's policies toward the United Nations and other international organizations, such as the International Criminal Court, as well as advocating for hardline measures on Venezuela and Cuba. Bolton had launched a broadside campaign against the ICC that resulted in the U.S. revoking the visa of the court's chief prosecutor after she sought permission to open an investigation into alleged war crimes committed by American troops and others in Afghanistan.
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| Alleged US spy extracted by CIA worked in Kremlin, Putin spokesman confirms Posted: 10 Sep 2019 11:28 AM PDT  Vladimir Putin's spokesman has confirmed that an alleged American spy worked in the Kremlin but claimed that he didn't have access to the Russian president. The story has raised questions about Donald Trump's handling of secrets as well as Russia's counter-intelligence operations. CNN quoted sources on Monday saying the CIA had extracted one of its highest-level covert sources in the Russian government in 2017 over fears Mr Trump's carelessness with classified intelligence could expose the agent. Online investigators soon found a 2017 Russian media report that Oleg Smolenkov, identified as an employee of Mr Putin's managerial affairs department, had gone missing with his wife Antonina and three children in the Balkan country of Montenegro in June of that year. "Antonina Smolenkova" and "Oleg Smokenkov," apparently a typo, bought a six-bedroom home near Washington DC in 2018. If Mr Smolenkov was indeed the US agent in question, the Russian authorities appeared to have been blindsided by his exfiltration, as they began investigating whether he and his family had been murdered in Montenegro. Although the managerial affairs department said that it had not employed the man, presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists on Tuesday that Mr Smolenkov had worked in the presidential administration before he was "fired by an internal order a few years ago". Asked if Mr Smolenkov had attended meetings with Mr Putin, the spokesman said "this position doesn't include any such contacts with the president" and said he did not know if the former employee had been a CIA agent. He said there were no problems with the work of Russian counter-intelligence. "All the reasoning by the American media about who urgently extracted whom and who saved whom and so forth is in the genre of pulp fiction," he said. Other reports said, however, that the "super-mole" had worked on foreign affairs and was close with top officials including presidential aide Yury Ushakov, Mr Putin's point man on relations with the United States. An archived copy of the Russian embassy web page showed that he had worked in Washington DC during the decade that Mr Ushakov was ambassador there. Mr Smolenkov worked at the Washington embassy with future presidential aide Yury Ushakov, seen here on the far left during Mr Putin's meeting with Kim Jong-un Credit: Alexei Nikolsky/Sputnik viaReuters Mr Smolenkov was responsible for buying service cars and goods for the embassy store before moving back to Moscow with Mr Ushakov in 2008, state media quoted a former colleague as saying. A man born in 1969 with the same name and patronymic as Mr Smolenkov insured a Volvo luxury sedan in Moscow at some time between 2007 and 2008 and a Toyota Land Cruiser in 2013, according to records found by the Telegraph. A diplomatic source in Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper compared Mr Smolenkov to a lackey character in the Alexander Griboyedov play Of Woe from Wit but said his work helping to organise Washington visits for high-level Russian officials — even taking them shopping for brand-name clothes — would have given him good contacts. Andrei Soldatov, author of several books about Russian intelligence, said the American spy revelations were a big blow to the presidential administration, which has become so central to decision-making that its employees end up handling sensitive information on almost all major foreign and domestic affairs. "It places these people in the centre of everything which is going on, from hackers to Donbass (in eastern Ukraine) to security," he told the Telegraph. Recruited years before landing a Kremlin position, the spy gave intelligence leading the CIA to conclude that Mr Putin wanted Mr Trump to win the presidency and ordered the campaign to interfere in the 2016 election, including the hacking of the Democratic National Committee, according to sources of the New York Times. A CNN source said the CIA "renewed earlier discussions" to exfiltrate the agent after Mr Trump shocked the intelligence community by revealing classified counter-terrorism information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador at a White House meeting in may 2017. The CIA, White House and current and former officials have denied that Mr Trump's disclosure prompted the decision to bring the agent to safety. It may have been motivated over concerns that the Russians would be looking for the source of the intelligence behind US spy agencies' statements that only Russia's highest officials could have authorised the hacking of emails from the DNC and Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman, sources told The Washington Post. Russian intelligence has been accused of assassination attempts in the UK including the poisoning British mole Sergei Skripal in 2018 and defector Alexander Litvinenko in 2006. Montenegro joined Nato in June 2017 but remained a popular seaside getaway for Russians, which would make it a prime choice for a US exfiltration operation. Moscow has been cracking down on officials holidaying overseas in recent years, this summer banning police officers with access to state secrets from travelling abroad. But no such ban is known to exist for presidential administration employees.
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| UPDATE 1-IBM, Fraunhofer partner on German-backed quantum computing research push Posted: 10 Sep 2019 11:18 AM PDT ![UPDATE 1-IBM, Fraunhofer partner on German-backed quantum computing research push]( "UPDATE 1-IBM, Fraunhofer partner on German-backed quantum computing research push") IBM is joining forces with a German research institute to explore the potential of quantum computing, backed by a government plan to invest 650 million euros ($717 million) over two years in wider research in the field. Berlin's support, sealed at a meeting on Tuesday between Chancellor Angela Merkel and IBM CEO Ginni Rometty, comes as Europe's biggest economy seeks to catch up to the United States and China in a global technology race.
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| In last words, Khashoggi asked killers not to suffocate him Posted: 10 Sep 2019 11:01 AM PDT  In his final words, slain Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi urged his killers not to cover his mouth because he suffered from asthma and could suffocate, according to Turkey's Sabah newspaper. Sabah newspaper, which is close to Turkey's government, published new details of a recording of Khashoggi's conversation with members of a Saudi hit squad sent to kill him. The paper says the recording of Khashoggi's grisly Oct. 2, 2018 killing and reported dismemberment at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul was obtained by Turkey's intelligence agency.
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| Officials: 31 Iraqi pilgrims die in stampede during holiday Posted: 10 Sep 2019 10:58 AM PDT  A walkway collapsed and set off a stampede in the holy city of Karbala on Tuesday as thousands of Shiite Muslims marked one of the most solemn holy days of the year. At least 31 people were killed and about 100 were injured, officials said. It was the deadliest stampede in recent history during Ashoura commemorations, when hundreds of thousands of people converge on the city, some 80 kilometers (50 miles) south of Baghdad, for the occasion every year.
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| UPDATE 1-Germany sticking to balanced budget goal, Merkel says Posted: 10 Sep 2019 10:42 AM PDT ![UPDATE 1-Germany sticking to balanced budget goal, Merkel says]( "UPDATE 1-Germany sticking to balanced budget goal, Merkel says") German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Tuesday her government was sticking to its balanced budget policy, tempering expectations for fiscal stimulus in Europe's largest economy. "As a federal government, we take seriously the responsibility for a solid budget policy," Merkel told an event organised by the German taxpayers' federation. Earlier, Finance Minister Olaf Scholz said Germany was ready to pump "many, many billions of euros" into its economy to counter any significant slowdown in growth and the country must take bold measures to fight climate change before it's too late.
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| US steps up anti-Iran campaign ahead of UN General Assembly Posted: 10 Sep 2019 10:23 AM PDT  The Trump administration is stepping up its campaign to get other nations to boost pressure on Iran as world leaders prepare to meet at the United Nations this month. The administration says the world should take action on Iran's non-compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal amid new questions about Iranian activities raised by the U.N. atomic watchdog. The U.S. has been ratcheting up its own sanctions on Iran since Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal last year.
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| Germany Sticks to Balanced Budget But Ready With ‘Many Billions’ Posted: 10 Sep 2019 10:11 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Germany is sticking to a balanced budget but is ready to act with "many billions" should its economy and that of Europe head into recession, Finance Minister Olaf Scholz said.In a speech to parliament Tuesday, Scholz confirmed Germany's long-standing zero-deficit policy would stand for next year's budget and allow already high investments to increase further."It's a solid budget that is being achieved without new debt," said the 61-year-old trained lawyer. "We used our room to maneuver, it's an expansionary budget that includes much investment."Yet Scholz also said the government will act if the current slowdown morphs into a genuine crisis and that Germany's solid finances have given the nation a sizable breathing space."It's central that we're in a position, with the financial fundamentals we have, to respond with many, many billions, if indeed an economic crisis erupts in Germany and Europe," Scholz told parliament. "And we will do it. That's Keynesian economics come alive, if you will."The yield on 10-year German bonds was little changed at -0.58% after the statement, while the euro was stable at $1.1041.His spending plans were approved in cabinet in June and face a vote in parliament in November.Pressure is mounting on Chancellor Angela Merkel's ruling coalition to loosen the purse strings as Europe's biggest economy flirts with a first recession in almost seven years. Export-dependent Germany is suffering the effects of a global slowdown, exacerbated by trade disputes, uncertainty over Brexit and turmoil in the Middle East.Later in the day, Merkel repeated her promise to stand by a balanced budget, while prioritizing potential tax cuts and reducing debt. The chancellor drew applause in a speech to a taxpayer association when she pledged to abolish in the long run the country's post-reunification solidarity tax, which her government with the SPD has agreed to scale back. She also said Germany must continue to reduce its public debt as a proportion of economic output to below 60%.Gross domestic product shrank 0.1% in the second quarter, and economists expect stagnation at best in the three months through September. Weighing most on business confidence and the economic outlook is the ongoing trade conflict between China and the U.S., Scholz said.Merkel and Scholz have so far resisted widespread calls for the government to abandon its policy of running balanced budgets, although the Social Democratic finance minister has begun to change his tone, emphasizing the need for large-scale investments.While more than 80% of economists surveyed by Bloomberg last week predicted the ECB will restart bond purchases, policy makers from the IMF, the ECB and as well as the U.S. government have called on countries with room for spending to use it.Germany will continue to deliver a balanced budget through 2023, Finance Ministry projections show. But some members of Scholz's SPD support taking advantage of extremely low interest rates to issue new debt to fund increased government spending.Jakob von Weizsaecker, the Finance Ministry's chief economist, has set out his vision for an investment program, while Bettina Hagedorn, a deputy finance minister, has said that plans to run balanced budgets through 2023 could be reviewed if economic conditions change.(Updates with Merkel comments in ninth paragraph.)\--With assistance from Patrick Donahue.To contact the reporters on this story: Birgit Jennen in Berlin at bjennen1@bloomberg.net;Arne Delfs in Berlin at adelfs@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Chad Thomas at cthomas16@bloomberg.net, Raymond Colitt, Iain RogersFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Freed in prisoner swap, Ukraine's Sentsov warns: Don't trust Russia Posted: 10 Sep 2019 10:09 AM PDT  Ukrainian filmmaker Oleg Sentsov on Tuesday warned against trusting Russian President Vladimir Putin, after Moscow freed him from jail in a historic prisoner swap with Kiev this weekend. Dressed casually in a polo shirt and jeans, the 43-year-old seemed calm and composed at his first news conference since flying to Kiev on Saturday along with 34 other Ukrainian prisoners. "As far as Russia's wishes for peace go, a wolf can put on a lamb's clothing, but his teeth don't disappear.
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| Benjamin Netanyahu proposes annexing large swathe of occupied West Bank ahead of election Posted: 10 Sep 2019 10:03 AM PDT  Benjamin Netanyahu has announced he would annex a large swathe of the occupied West Bank into Israel if he wins next week's election, a move that could shatter any lingering hopes of creating a future Palestinian state. The Israeli prime minister said on Tuesday that if he is re-elected in seven days he will move quickly to annex the Jordan Valley, a strategic strip of land that borders Jordan and constitutes around a third of the West Bank. The move, if it actually went ahead, would fundamentally redraw Israel's borders and force the international community to ask whether there was any possibly of a Two State Solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. "I believe we have a unique one-off opportunity to do something for which there is wide consensus to finally create secure, permanent borders for the state of Israel," Mr Netanyahu said. "We haven't had such an opportunity since the Six Day War and I doubt we will have another opportunity in the next 50 years." Mr Netanyahu's announcement was widely seen in Israel as a pre-election stunt designed to win over Right-wing voters and many questioned whether he would seriously follow through with it. This is just my rough map but you can see Netanyahu is proposing annexing essentially a third of the West Bank. Very hard to see how anyone can say a Palestinian state is still possible if that happens. pic.twitter.com/jFm3ySLoWl— Raf Sanchez (@rafsanchez) September 10, 2019 He made promises about annexing parts of the West Bank ahead of the last Israeli election in April and did not follow through. However, those pledges were not as detailed as his plan to take the Jordan Valley. Mr Netanyahu hinted that Donald Trump had given him the green light for the sweeping annexation but did not say so explicitly. He said merely that "diplomatic conditions have ripened" for announcing the move. Saeb Erekat, a senior Palestinian official, said if Mr Netanyahu went ahead "he will have buried any chance for peace for the next 100 years. Israelis and the international community must stop this insanity". There was no immediate comment from the White House. Mr Trump has been a strong supporter of Mr Netanyahu and handed him a pre-election gift in March by recognising Israel's annexation of the Golan Heights, a strategic plateau captured from Syria in 1967. However, Mr Netanyahu has appeared rattled in the last week by Mr Trump's apparent willingness to meet with Hassan Rouhani, the president of Iran. Israeli soldiers stand guard in an old army outpost overlooking the Jordan Valley Credit: ABIR SULTAN/AFP/Getty Images Mr Trump has said several times he is open to such a meeting - which would be the first since the 1979 Iranian Revolution - despite Mr Netanyahu's repeated warnings against negotiating with Iran. Mr Netanyahu's proposed annexation of the Jordan Valley would change little in the daily lives of the tens of thousands of Palestinians who live there. The plan does not include annexing the city of Jericho and Palestinians in the area already live under Israeli security control when they move between towns. But at a diplomatic level, the move could cause the relatively moderate Palestinian Authority to give up on its hopes of establishing a Palestinian state in the West Bank and empower more extreme factions like Hamas, which advocates the overall destruction of Israel. Britain and other European states might also be forced to revise their long held commitment to the formula of Two States, which they have held to since the 1990s despite the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Blue and White, the centrist party running against Mr Netanyahu, said they favoured keeping the Jordan Valley "part of Israel forever" but criticised the prime minister for using it as "propaganda" ahead of the election. Israeli politicians of all stripes have long argued that Israel must retain security control of the Jordan Valley so that its coastal heartland could never again be attacked from the east. A recent poll by the Israel Democracy Institute found that less than half of Israelis supported annexing the Jordan Valley even if the plan was supported by Mr Trump.
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| UPDATE 6-Trump fires foreign policy hawk Bolton, citing strong disagreements Posted: 10 Sep 2019 09:28 AM PDT ![UPDATE 6-Trump fires foreign policy hawk Bolton, citing strong disagreements]( "UPDATE 6-Trump fires foreign policy hawk Bolton, citing strong disagreements") U.S. President Donald Trump abruptly fired his national security adviser John Bolton amid disagreements with his hard-line aide over how to handle foreign policy challenges such as North Korea, Iran, Afghanistan and Russia. "I informed John Bolton last night that his services are no longer needed at the White House. Bolton, a leading foreign policy hawk and Trump's third national security adviser, had pressed the president not to let up pressure on North Korea despite diplomatic efforts.
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| Egypt arrests 16 suspected Muslim Brotherhood members Posted: 10 Sep 2019 09:28 AM PDT ![Egypt arrests 16 suspected Muslim Brotherhood members]( "Egypt arrests 16 suspected Muslim Brotherhood members") Egypt says police have arrested 16 suspected Muslim Brotherhood members for allegedly smuggling currency out of the country and plotting militant attacks in Egypt. The Interior Ministry said Tuesday the suspects were collaborating with wanted Brotherhood members in Turkey to help smuggle wanted Islamists from Egypt to Europe. It says in a statement the suspects also provided funds for Brotherhood members to carry out militant attacks in Egypt.
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| Pakistan: Risk of 'accidental war' with India over Kashmir Posted: 10 Sep 2019 09:27 AM PDT  Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi accused India at a session of the U.N.-backed Human Rights Council of turning Kashmir "into the largest prison on this planet." He alleged some Kashmiris were tortured and raped in the region claimed by both Pakistan and India. "I shudder to mention the word 'genocide' here, but I must," Qureshi said.
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| 500 refugees trapped in Libya to be evacuated to Rwanda Posted: 10 Sep 2019 09:25 AM PDT  Rwanda agreed Tuesday to take in 500 refugees and asylum-seekers trapped in Libya under an agreement signed with the United Nations and African Union. The deal comes after repeated allegations of dire conditions for migrants in Libya's detention centers, including beatings and other abuses, rape and a lack of both medical care and food. Many are intercepted in the Mediterranean by the EU-funded Libyan coast guard, which itself has been the repeated focus of abuse allegations.
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| US drops 40 tons of bombs on IS-'infested' island in Iraq Posted: 10 Sep 2019 09:13 AM PDT ![US drops 40 tons of bombs on IS-'infested' island in Iraq]( "US drops 40 tons of bombs on IS-'infested' island in Iraq") The U.S.-led coalition says American warplanes have dropped 36,000 kilograms (40 tons) of bombs on an Island in the Tigris River "infested" with members of the Islamic State group. The coalition said F15 and F35 warplanes took part in the bombing on Qanus Island in the central province of Salaheddine, north of the capital Baghdad. Tuesday's attack is part of operations carried out by Iraqi forces and the U.S.-led coalition against IS, which was defeated in Iraq in 2017.
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| Britain urges N. Korea to honour missile commitments after new tests Posted: 10 Sep 2019 09:06 AM PDT ![Britain urges N. Korea to honour missile commitments after new tests]( "Britain urges N. Korea to honour missile commitments after new tests") Britain urged North Korea to stand by its commitments to resume stalled denuclearisation talks with the United States after Pyongyang fired a new round of projectiles on Tuesday. "We are concerned that North Korea has conducted a further set of short range ballistic missile tests, another clear violation of UN Security Council Resolutions," the UK Foreign Office said in a statement.
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| Trumpworld Gloats as Bolton Bolts Posted: 10 Sep 2019 09:04 AM PDT  Chip SomodevillaDonald Trump on Tuesday announced that he had fired his national security adviser John Bolton, in what is the latest indication of unrest and tension inside the president's national security team."I informed John Bolton last night that his services are no longer needed at the White House," the president tweeted. "I disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions, as did others in the Administration, and therefore I asked John for his resignation, which was given to me this morning. I thank John very much for his service. I will be naming a new National Security Advisor next week."Bolton was scheduled to attend a press briefing at 1:30 p.m. with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of the Treasury Steve Mnuchin. And moments after Trump's announcement, Bolton himself seemed to directly contradict the president's account of the departure, writing: "I offered to resign last night and President Trump said, 'Let's talk about it tomorrow.'"In a text to The Daily Beast, White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham disputed the now-former national security adviser's description of how he left the administration. "Last night, Potus said he wanted Bolton's resignation on his desk tomorrow AM. Bolton delivered it. Simply put, many of Bolton's policy priorities did not align w POTUS," Grisham said. Bolton responded in a text to The Daily Beast: "[White House] press secretary statement is flatly incorrect."Bolton had served as Trump's third national-security adviser since April 9, 2018. Charlie Kupperman will serve as acting national security adviser.By the time of his ouster, Bolton had few remaining allies inside the administration. And at the subsequent briefing, both Pompeo and Mnuchin did little to hold back their evident satisfaction that Bolton had been sidelined. "There were many times Ambassador Bolton and I disagreed," said Pompeo. "That's to be sure, but that's true with a lot of people with whom I interact.""The president's view of the Iraq War and Bolton's were very different," said Mnuchin. "The president has made that clear."In Trumpworld writ large, there was loud gloating and celebration on Tuesday afternoon among those who had long opposed Bolton as antithetical to Trump's skepticism of certain foreign interventions and his nationalist platform."With the exception of the neocons who were hoping Bolton would lead us into World War III, the rest of the country is breathing easier today with him out of the White House," said Andrew Surabian, a GOP strategist and former Trump White House official. "President Trump's anti-intervention and anti-regime change instincts on foreign policy are a big reason why he was elected in 2016 and he deserves a National Security Adviser who reflects those instincts."Bolton's departure comes as the United States is facing numerous high-level foreign policy negotiations, namely the ongoing challenges in Iran, Afghanistan, and North Korea. Bolton reportedly clashed with the president over many major foreign-policy decisions, so much so that Trump reportedly called his former national security adviser, Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster to tell him how much he missed him. Mnuchin called a question of whether Trump's national security team was "a mess" to be among "the most ridiculous" he had ever heard. But Bolton's exit sent shockwaves on Capitol Hill, where opinion of his performance is sharply divided. Senator Mitt Romney (R-UT) called it an "extraordinary loss," calling Bolton "a brilliant man with decades of experience." "His point of view was not always the same as everybody else in the room," Romney added. "That's why you wanted him there. The fact that he was a contrarian from time to time is an asset, not a liability."But not everyone was saddened by the news. An aide to a senator who favors diplomacy with Iran said of Bolton: "He's been 'failing upwards' for a long time, and finally someone had the gumption to show him the door. Ding dong the witch is dead."Bolton is famous—and, in many circles, infamous—for his hawkish foreign policy positions. As a member of the George W. Bush administration, he advocated for the Iraq invasion. Trump meanwhile, made his self-proclaimed opposition to that war a key component of his 2016 presidential campaign. Bolton also has long held an ultra-hawkish view of the Iranian government, and called for regime change as recently as 2017. After touting the prospect of regime change in a speech to a group of Iranian dissidents in 2017, he concluded by crying, "And that's why, before 2019, we here will celebrate in Tehran!"The president, meanwhile, has embraced considerably less hawkish rhetoric toward the Islamic Republic. He's also expressed openness to meeting with its president, Hassan Rouhani, including for a potential pull-aside at the upcoming UN General Assembly. Two U.S. officials said Bolton strongly opposed such a conversation. And, as The Daily Beast first reported, Fox News host Tucker Carlson—an enthusiastic opponent of military engagement with Iran—has urged Trump to stiff-arm his hawkish advisors.—With reporting by Erin Banco and Sam Brodey.Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| China’s Ambassador to South Africa Attacks Trump Over Trade Posted: 10 Sep 2019 09:04 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Terms of Trade is a daily newsletter that untangles a world embroiled in trade wars. Sign up here. Lin Songtian, China's ambassador to South Africa, took out a half-page advertisement in a key local newspaper to attack the stance of the U.S. and President Donald Trump on global trade.In a paid-for editorial in Business Day, South Africa's biggest financial newspaper, Lin said bullying by the U.S. will drive the world into a "severe recession" and accused Trump of capriciousness."The Chinese culture emphasizes that 'gentlemen keep their words.' Honoring the promises and commitments is the basic ethical code and requirement for state leaders and businessmen," he said in the advert titled 'Voice of China.' His comments were also published in the Star newspaper."The president of the U.S. runs his country according to his own will, dictates the world through Twitter and changes his position overnight," Lin said.The column, part of a drive by Beijing to have its ambassadors speak out globally, reflects the deteriorating relationship between the world's two biggest economies. The Chinese Communist Party's flagship newspaper on Tuesday accused Trump adviser Peter Navarro of lying. A day earlier, Ted McKinney, the U.S. Agriculture Department's top trade official, called Chinese President Xi Jinping a "communist zealot."The U.S. embassy in South Africa declined to comment.Tit-for-tat import tariffs imposed by the U.S. and China are roiling world markets and upending global trade patterns."The U.S. insisting on escalating the trade frictions with China will harm the common interests of all people around the world and no one can escape," Lin said. "The U.S. clings to the winner takes all law of the jungle."Actions by the U.S. are harming its own economy as China's technological companies will need to establish new supply chains and its agricultural goods importers are already finding other sources of crops such as soybeans, which are being acquired from Brazil, he said. Trump is damaging his reputation and that of his country, he added."Even God doesn't know what he will do tomorrow," Lin said. "Such a U.S. model of democracy has become the laughing stock of all people around the world."(Adds soybean buying in ninth paragraph)To contact the reporter on this story: Antony Sguazzin in Johannesburg at asguazzin@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: John McCorry at jmccorry@bloomberg.net, Pauline Bax, Gordon BellFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| UK accuses Iran of selling oil from seized tanker to Syria Posted: 10 Sep 2019 09:00 AM PDT  Foreign Office says Tehran breaching assurances with sale to 'Assad's murderous regime'The Adrian Darya 1, pictured late last month, was photographed off the Syrian coast last week. Photograph: Johnny Bugeja/AFP/Getty ImagesBritain has accused Iran of breaching assurances that it would not sell oil to Syria from an Iranian tanker released by authorities in Gibraltar on the condition that the 2.1m barrels it was carrying would not be sold to the "murderous regime" of Bashar al-Assad.Tehran acknowledged at the weekend that the oil had been sold and the reflagged tanker Adrian Darya 1, previously known as Grace 1, had reached its final destination, after the ship was photographed off the coast of Syria.Iran, desperate for revenue from oil exports, did not formally confirm the customer was Syria.The UK foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, summoned Hamid Baeidinejad, the Iranian ambassador to the UK, to a meeting on Wednesday to ask why the assurances given to the Gibraltarian authorities had not been honoured.In July 2015, Iran and a six-nation negotiating group reached a landmark agreement known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action that ended a 12-year deadlock over Tehran's nuclear programme. The deal, struck in Vienna after nearly two years of intensive talks, limited the Iranian programme, to reassure the rest of the world that it cannot develop nuclear weapons, in return for sanctions relief. At its core, the JCPOA is a straightforward bargain: Iran's acceptance of strict limits on its nuclear programme in return for an escape from the sanctions that grew up around its economy over a decade prior to the accord. Under the deal, Iran unplugged two-thirds of its centrifuges, shipped out 98% of its enriched uranium and filled its plutonium production reactor with concrete. Tehran also accepted extensive monitoring by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which has verified 10 times since the agreement, and as recently as February, that Tehran has complied with its terms. In return, all nuclear-related sanctions were lifted in January 2016, reconnecting Iran to global markets.The six major powers involved in the nuclear talks with Iran were in a group known as the P5+1: the UN security council's five permanent members – China, France, Russia, the UK and the US – and Germany. The nuclear deal is also enshrined in a UN security council resolution that incorporated it into international law. The 15 members of the council at the time unanimously endorsed the agreement.On 8 May 2018, US president Donald Trump pulled his country out of the deal. Iran announced its partial withdrawal from the nuclear deal a year later.Saeed Kamali Dehghan, Iran correspondentBritish officials are relatively certain from intelligence assessments that the oil was offloaded on to smaller boats.British marines seized Grace 1 in July after it entered Gibraltarian waters, claiming the oil was destined for Assad and Syria in breach of EU economic sanctions.The Foreign Office says Iranian officials gave as many as five different assurances to British officials – including one in writing to Gibraltar's government – that the ship's cargo would not go to Syria."Iran repeatedly gave assurances to the government of Gibraltar that the Grace 1/Adrian Darya 1 would not deliver oil to any EU-sanctioned entity in Syria or elsewhere. It is now clear that Iran has breached these assurances and that the oil has been transferred to Syria and Assad's murderous regime," the Foreign Office said in a statement."Iran's actions represent an unacceptable violation of international norms and the UK will raise the issue at the United Nations later this month."Raab said: "Iran has shown complete disregard for its own assurances over Adrian Darya 1. This sale of oil to Assad's brutal regime is part of a pattern of behaviour by the government of Iran designed to disrupt regional security."This includes illegally supplying weapons to Houthi insurgents in Yemen, support for Hezbollah terrorists and most recently its attempts to hijack commercial ships passing through the Gulf."We want Iran to come in from the cold, but the only way to do that is to keep its word and comply with the rules-based international system."The UK insisted the tanker was seized only in pursuit of EU sanctions policy, and not in support of the US effort to cut off Iranian oil exports, a strategy with which the UK does not agree.Britain is pursuing a policy of maximum economic pressure on Iran in an attempt to force Tehran to renegotiate the joint comprehensive plan of action, a deal on Iran's nuclear programme signed in 2015.Iran has argued it was not a party to the EU sanctions against Damascus, but also said the oil was not destined for Syria. Subsequently, following negotiations both in the Foreign Office in London and in Gibraltar, the British claimed assurances had been given that the oil would not be sold to Syria.The US attempted to block the departure of the ship from Gibraltar, and US officials then tried to contact the captain of the ship to offer him a substantial sum in return for not selling the oil to Syria but instead taking the ship to a port at which the US could seize the cargo.The Gibraltar first minister, Fabian Picardo, said in a statement: "It will be a massive volte face for Iran to have failed to live up to its written undertaking in the full glare of international public opinion."They will really make themselves look shifty and unreliable if they have acted contrary to their repeated assertions and undertakings."
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