Surrender Is Not an Option:
Defending America at the United
Nations by John Bolton
Surrender Us Not An Option Defending America At The United Nations
With no-holds-barred candor, the straight-talking former ambassador to the
United Nations takes readers behind the scenes at the UN and the U.S.
State Department and reveals why his efforts to defend American interests
and reform the UN resulted in controversy. A veteran of three Republican
administrations and a nominee for the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize, Bolton
shows how the U.S. can lead the way to a more realistic global security
arrangement for the twenty-first century and identifies the next generation
of threats to America.The son of a Baltimore firefighter and the first person
in his family to go to college, with scholarships to Yale University and Yale
Law School, John Bolton studied with preeminent conservative thinkers
Robert Bork and Ralph Winter. After law school, he experienced the
Reagan Revolution firsthand in Edwin Meeses justice department -- where
the American judiciary was fundamentally reshaped. His diplomatic skills

were honed working with Secretary of State James Baker during the
presidency of George H. W. Bush, and serving in the administration of
President George W. Bush as Undersecretary of State for Arms Control
and International Security Affairs. In this revealing memoir, he candidly
recounts his appointment in 2005 as Ambassador to the United Nations,
his headline-making Senate confirmation battle, which resulted in his
recess appointment, and his sixteen-month tenure at the United Nations.
Bolton offers keen insight into such international crises as North Koreas
nuclear test, Irans pursuit of nuclear weapons, the genocide in Darfur, the
monthlong negotiation that produced the controversial end of hostilities
between Israel and Hezbollah, and more. Recounting both his successes
and frustrations in taking a hard line against weapons-of-mass destruction
proliferators, terrorists, and rogue states such as North Korea and Iran, he
also exposes the operational inadequacies that hinder the UNs
effectiveness in international diplomacy and its bias against Israel and the
United States. At home, he criticizes the pernicious bureaucratic inertia in
the U.S. State Department that can undermine presidential policy.A
fascinating chronicle of the career of a distinguished lawyer and diplomat
who has fought to preserve American sovereignty and strength at home
and abroad, Surrender Is Not an Option is the candid memoir of one of
Americas outstanding statesmen that is sure to become required reading
for everyone interested in international affairs.
Personal Review: Surrender Is Not an Option: Defending
America at the United Nations by John Bolton
We already knew that "one-man-one-vote" makes for messy domestic
politics; now John Bolton shows how messy "one-nation-one-vote" is in
international politics. Many of us laughed when President Bush appointed
John Bolton to be America's ambassador to the United Nations. Our first
thought was that he'd be a bull in a china shop. Bolton's book shows us
that he was just the right bull, and that the UN was just the right china
shop. In retrospect we have Bolton to thank for a remarkably thorough
insider's expose of the dysfunctionalism at the UN's core, and its apathetic,
self-absorbed leaderlessness under Kofi Anan. He shows how the UN
encourages and enables the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction
by consistently yielding to the timid and indecisive in order to obtain
consensus. He shows us the UN's "culture of inaction," and "surrender as
a matter of high principle." Bolton is a clear thinker and an engaging
writer, and no matter what your views of him as a classic Bush
administration neocon, the objective reader of his book comes away proud
to have had him representing the United States and wondering what he
might have accomplished given more time.
Bolton entertains with substance rather than craft, though his editorial
humor is ever-present. He notes, for instance that before we wish for
reforms that make the UN more effective, we should recognize that its very
ineffectiveness is a safeguard against the damage the UN can do. He is a
master at capturing his adversaries' deficiencies in a phrase, as when he
speaks of the multilateralists' dereliction of duty as "outsourcing our foreign

policy." Ambassador Bolton describes in detail his battles in the "twilight
zone at Turtle Bay:" the Oil for Food Scandal, the nuclear proliferation of
North Korea and Iran, the Peace-Building Commission, Zionism as
Racism, the Human Rights Commission, the drafting of "Outcome
Documents," and the brawling over the budget. If any American still labors
under the misimpression that the UN is a force for the good in the world,
this book will be very illuminating. That large numbers of our State
Department's "permanent bureaucracy" still hold that view is very
disturbing.
Ambassador Bolton distills all of his experience with the UN down to one
inescapable conclusion. Among all the reform proposals the UN may
consider, one reform alone is worth the effort, changing assessed
contributions to voluntary contributions. Only with that change, and with
that change only, will the UN become accountable for results, and will the
United States have the confidence that its money is well spent. Senator
Lincoln Chafee, who put his personal interests above those of the country,
will forever carry the stigma of setting back the clock on that effort by
obstructing Bolton's reconfirmation.
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