For John Bolton, the rapid growth of Iran’s influence in the West is a personal matter — so much so that he is reminded of it every time he leaves his home.
The former US national security adviser told The National how his life has changed since the FBI stopped an Iranian citizen’s plot to assassinate him on American soil.
As a veteran of four Republican administrations, Mr Bolton, 74, is no stranger to living in the spotlight as well as in the shadow of Secret Service protection.
But rather than the hallmark of a government position, the presence of his round-the-clock security detail these days is a tangible reminder of the lengths Tehran is willing to go to silence criticism both at home and abroad.
“It's obviously evidence of what Iran is capable of, what it's up to,” he said.
“I think it shows the extent to which they are prepared to go — trying to hire a hitman to assassinate me and that sort of thing.”
The US Department of Justice in August 2022 charged Shahram Poursafi, a member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, with plotting to murder Mr Bolton.
The government suspects the plan to kill Mr Bolton — a prominent critic of Iran — was probably a retaliatory act for the death of Qassem Suleimani.
Despite personal threats to his security, Mr Bolton said he is considering running for president in 2024. His final decision, however, will be a carefully calculated one.
“I’m considering it,” he said. “It’s obviously a very significant decision to make. I’m not going to make it lightly. I’m talking to a lot of people and trying to assess what people think of it.”
While he mulls a potential challenge to his former boss Donald Trump’s bid to secure the Republican nomination next year, Mr Bolton’s eyes are equally fixed on matters abroad.
For decades, he has held hawkish foreign policy views, a sentiment that has only been entrenched by Iran’s recent activities.
Iran spreading its influence in the West adds another layer to the threat posed by the nation, which has long been focused on nuclear ambitions, Mr Bolton said.
“In the Middle East, or really around the world, the propensity of Iran to engage in terrorist activity or to sponsor terrorist groups is not diminished at all,” he said. “It continues to grow.
“And so it's not simply the threat of the Iran nuclear weapons programme that people should be worried about, but it's the state terrorist itself and it supports other terrorist organisations.”
The former US ambassador to the UN played an integral part in America’s 2019 move to recognise the IRGC as a terrorist organisation. He backed calls by British MPs and campaigners for the UK government to follow suit, saying a terror label is “an accurate description of how the IRGC behaves”.
The notion that western governments need to refrain from such a move to keep a communication channel with Tehran open is nonsense, he said, pointing to the frequent and effective use of “back channels” in negotiations.
“Not acknowledging the reality what the government of Iran is, I think, a big mistake,” he added. “The EU is also considering the designation of the IRGC as a terrorist organisation. So I hope both the UK and the EU do it and join the United States. It will make our pressure on Iran much more effective.”
A long-time opponent of the Iran nuclear deal, Mr Bolton dismissed ongoing efforts to revive the Barack Obama-brokered accord as “foolish”.
China-Russia warnings proving to be accurate
He also views the failure of the US and its allies to weaken the China-Russia axis as intrinsically linked to the international community’s reluctance to get tough on Iran.
While world leaders accuse the Iranian regime of human rights abuses over its treatment of protesters following Mahsa Amini’s death, it continues to sell oil to China and drones to Russia, in spite of heavy sanctions.
The bolstering of Sino-Russian relations and its far-reaching consequences is an example of how the world is witnessing a shift from regional crises to global threats, Mr Bolton said.
The seasoned diplomat believes it is high time world leaders woke up to this reality.
The withdrawal of American and British forces from Afghanistan in 2021, which paved the path for the Taliban’s return to power, created a vacuum that China and Russia likely view as a major opportunity to spread their influence in the region, he warned.
“The first thing the West has to do is wake up, and frankly, the Middle East needs to wake up, too,” he said.
The likelihood of Iran’s hardline regime being overthrown is more conceivable today than at any other point since the revolution of 1979, Mr Bolton said.
The country has, since last September, been gripped by the largest anti-government protests in decades.
“I think if key figures in the military and maybe even the Revolutionary Guard see they’re going down a dead end, then we’ll see the regime overthrown,” he explained.
“It’s likelier today than it was six months ago. I think they’ve crossed a line. The demonstrators are no longer shouting ‘death to Israel and death to the United States’. They’re shouting death to ‘[Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei'.”
