Sunday afternoon, Eric Shawn of Fox News interviewed former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton.
By his reactions to what Bolton said near the interview's beginning, Shawn misunderstood the meaning of "false flag operation," apparently believing that every such effort has to be originated by the government leveling a charge of nefarious behavior against another, in this case the U.S. against Russia. That's not what it means. Though Bolton clarified his statement later in the interview, news outlets which should know better and opportunistic lefty bloggers have seized the opening to contend that Bolton has directly accused the Obama administration of conducting the "false flag operation." That's not what he said.
"False flags" are "covert operations that are designed to deceive in such a way that the operations appear as though they are being carried out by entities, groups, or nations other than those who actually planned and executed." The definition certainly isn't limited to the "victimized" entity being the one orchestrating the "false flag." It could relate to anyone attempting to make someone else look bad and making it appear as if some other party orchestrated the attempt.
Bolton didn't detect Shawn's apparent misunderstanding until the very end of the interview, and then clarified what he meant.
As will be seen in the interview segment which follows, the ginned-up controversy over "false flag operations" is obscuring a very important point made about the nature of the hacks which anonymous Obama administration officials have accused Russia of orchestrating.
Transcript (from the beginning to 1:52 mark):
JOHN BOLTON: That's why I say we have to know the facts here, and it's not at all clear to me, just viewing this from the outside, that this hacking into the DNC and the RNC computers was not a false flag operation.
Let's remember what FBI director James Comey said dealing with Hillary's home-brew server. He said, "We found no direct evidence of foreign intelligence service penetration, but given the nature of this, we didn't expect to" — meaning a really sophisticated foreign intelligence service would not leave any cyber fingerprints. And yet people say they did leaves cyber fingerprints in the hacks regarding our elections.
So the question that has to be asked is, "Why did the Russians run their smart intelligent service against Hillary server, but their dumb intelligence services against the election?"
ERIC SHAWN: When you say "false flag," that's a very serious charge. I mean false flag by whom? Here's the Washington Post. The Post reported, "The CIA has concluded that individuals with close ties to the Russian government hacked the emails. Intelligence officials have determined that Russia's goal was to help Trump win rather than simply undermine confidence in the election. Are you actually accusing someone here in this administration in the intelligence community of trying to throw something?
BOLTON: We just don't know. But I believe that intelligence has been politicized in the Obama administration to a very significant degree.
Bolton answer, charitably interpreted (and clarified later in any event), seems to concentrate on the "throw something" element of Shawn's question, referring to the CIA possibly working up bogus charges or conclusions, and not to be directly addressing the "false flag" element of Shawn's question — even though Shawn clearly wanted Bolton to address that "false flag" element.
Resuming:
SHAWN: But would the agents, the intelligence officials, politicize this, to go so far to something that could potentially damage the very issue of our republic and what we for 200+ years have stood for?
BOLTON: Well, now I think the whole thing is called into question, which is why the notion of some kind of independent investigation becomes extremely important. I do think it's critical to answer the question I posed: "If you think the Russians did this, then why did they leave fingerprints?"
Bolton effectively turned the interview around, and Shawn floundered, among other things trying to claim that the CIA and FBI have different "standards" for detecting digital fingerprints. The conversation then went to press releases and statements by U.S. Senators, and Bolton advocated for some form of retaliation if it is shown that the Russians attempted to do what the CIA "consensus" currently accuses them of doing.
At the 3:30 mark, Shawn got into the issue of what President Obama plans to do about all of this, and Bolton eventually clarified his "false flag" comment:
SHAWN: The President has ordered this public review. What are you calling on the President now to do before before January 20th — to reveal the classified information, to bring it all out so that Americans can finally know if Russia did indeed have a hand in this election?
BOLTON: Well one thing that makes me very nervous is Barack Obama saying, "Let's have this Report before 20th of January so that I can wrap it up."
I think the burden, for well or ill, is going to fall on Mike Pompeo, who has been named as President-Elect Trump's CIA director. I think he's trusted by Republicans and Democrats alike. He doesn't bring any baggage to this. He's coming in as the new official at the CIA. I'd look to him to head up an investigation across the entire intelligence community.
I just think these are such serious charges. Again, if the Russians or any other foreign government think that they can undermine the integrity of our elections or defeat our constitutional process, this is just as serious an attack as a military attack.
SHAWN: And to those who are very bothered by your claim of a potential false flag — I mean that's incredibly serious to say that, and very disturbing as an American.
BOLTON: Well, we would want to know who else might want to influence the election, and why they would leave fingerprints that point to the Russians.
That's why I say until we know more about how the intelligence community came to this conclusion, we don't know if this Russian-inspired or a false flag.
The last bolded statement clearly shows that Bolton believes that if there is indeed a "false flag" at work, it's a "who else" conducting it, i.e., not the Obama administration or the U.S. government itself. Unfortunately, it took Bolton over four minutes and serious hyperventilating by Shawn before he made this point clear.
Sadly, the first 40 seconds or so, in isolation, make it look as if Bolton was directly implicating the Obama administration in a "false flag" operation.
The temptation to post an out-of-context video snip or to make out-of-context charges has proven too strong for the following outlets to resist:
- Mediaite — "John Bolton Apparently Believes CIA May Have Fabricated Russia Election Hack"
- Zero Hedge — "Trump Slams "Conspiracy Theory" After John Bolton Suggests Russian Hack Was "False Flag" By Obama Administration"
- UK Guardian reporter Ben Jacobs, in a tweet — "John Bolton suggests DNC hack was potentially a false flag operation by the Obama administration." Jacobs even carried the "who else" quote at the end of the interview which refutes the charge that Bolton was accusing the Obama administration.
- Rebecca Morin at the Politico — "Bolton: Russian hacks could actually have been by Obama administration" Morin also carried the "who else" quote, and it didn't faze her a bit.
- Washington Post (naturally) — "Bolton suggests Russian election hacks were ‘false flag’ by Obama administration"
- Huffington Post (like clockwork) — "John Bolton Implies Obama Administration Could Be Behind ‘False Flag’ Election Hack"
To his credit, and unlike the others above, all of whom should know better, Josh Marshall at the leftist Talking Points Memo gave the matter a fair and balanced treatment:
On first read it certainly appears that he is saying such an operation may have been hatched by the current administration. He does not quite say that in so many words. And I have spoken to others that suggest Bolton is speaking of another country mounting such an operation. I'm printing the transcript of the exchange in full for people to make their own judgment.
Gee, I wonder how many of the half-dozen outlets above "have spoken to others"?
Though he could have been and should have been more pointed, I think it's pretty clear that Bolton was not tagging the Obama administration with possible "false flag" responsibility — and the default assumption on the part of many that he was, based on what he actually said, is more than a little offensive.
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
