The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir

by John Bolton

right way to impose sanctions is to do so swiftly and unexpectedly; make them broad and comprehensive, not piecemeal; and enforce them rigorously, using military assets to interdict illicit commerce if necessary. This was the formula the Bush 41 Administration used immediately after Saddam Hussein’s August 1990 invasion of Kuwait, with devastating effect. But even there, it was not sufficient. Although badly weakened, Iraq still smuggled out enough oil to survive, thus ultimately necessitating military force to oust it from Kuwait. But for a road map on imposing sanctions swiftly and comprehensively, UN Security Council Resolutions 661, enumerating the sanctions on Iraq, and 665, authorizing the use of military force to carry them out, remain key documents. Instead, especially under Obama, sanctions began to be applied as if they were individual judicial decisions against specific entities and individuals. This approach did exist under certain sanctions authorities in US law, intended for more limited purposes than dealing with massive threats like Iraq in 1990–91, but it was a mistake to expand the practice. Instead, legislation should have been amended where necessary to allow for sweeping sanctions without quasi-prosecutorial investigations and quasi-judicial determinations at the Treasury Department.