President Donald Trump explained Thursday why he hired former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton as a National Security adviser, despite disagreeing with him on many foreign policy issues.
The president commented during an interview with the Wall Street Journal:
The only thing I liked about Bolton was that everybody thought he was crazy. And frankly, when you walk into the room with him, you’re in a good negotiating position. Because they figure you’re going to war if John Bolton was there. He wanted to go to war with everybody. He never saw a war he didn’t like.
Trump criticized Bolton’s hawkish position on foreign policy and said he disagreed with him a lot.
“I view him as a disgruntled employee. Very unhappy. Hated to leave,” Trump said and added, “He had a lot of policy disputes, he and I.”
Trump said he could never understand why Bolton continued to defend the decision that the George W. Bush administration made to invade Iraq.
“That’s when I lost him,” Trump said. “But no, I disagreed with much of the stuff he said. He was one of many people. I liked listening to many people, and then doing whatever is the right thing to do.”