Trump had no idea UK was a nuclear power and believed Finland was a part of Russia, claims John Bolton memoir
President Donald Trump had little idea about Britain, one of the US’ oldest and closest allies, being a nuclear power, a new book penned by his former national security adviser John Bolton has revealed. The Trump administration has made a legal move to stall the release of the book ‘The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir’ citing it contained classified information but copies of the 592-page publication have already been leaked to various media houses, including The New York Times, The Washington Post and Daily Mail. The tome is expected to hit the shelves on June 23.
Other insights about Trump’s dubious knowledge on foreign policy affairs were also revealed in the book, including the fact that he thought Finland was a part of Russia. The book also features various private conversations that the president had about other world leaders. One serious revelation was that Trump pleaded with Chinese President Xi Xinping to ensure that he would win his re-election bid by buying American crops. Last December, Trump was impeached by the House on the charges that he misused his presidential power by seeking help from another foreign government (Ukraine) to make electoral gains at home.
About Trump’s limited idea about Britain being a nuclear power, the book said during a meeting with then British prime minister Theresa May in 2018, Trump interjected to ask a British official: “Oh, are you a nuclear power?” after he referred to the UK as one. The UK became the third nuclear power in the world after the US and former Soviet Union and made its first test in October 1952, less than a decade after the US bombed the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during the Second World War. Its current submarine-based deterrent force is based on US Trident Missiles. Bolton, 71, wrote he could tell that Trump’s question “was not intended as a joke”. The ultra-hawkish former aide to Trump served as his NSA between April 2018 and September 2019 when he was removed on grounds of indifferences with the commander-in-chief.
'Trump thought nuclear weapons were limited to US and Russia'
A former US official also said about a similar conversation between Trump and May when the former made a state visit to the UK in June last year. “He told May the number one existential threat is still nuclear weapons, and not climate change or any of these other issues that all these other people were raising,” The Guardian quoted the former official as saying. The official also said that when the former British premier asked how that would affect the UK deterrent, Trump appeared to be surprised for he thought it was something limited to the US and Russia. “He didn’t really factor in the other countries,” the official said.