Previous Republican administrations have named tough talkers, such as Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Jeane Kirkpatrick, to be ambassador to the United Nations. Nonetheless, George W. Bush's nomination of John Bolton to be his man in New York will give his partners around the world pause. Not only has Mr Bolton proved to be very abrasive as the State Department's chief arms controller over the past four years, but he is also an avowed unilateralist and long-standing critic of the UN. On the face of it, his appointment runs counter to the US president's apparent new stress, especially during his trip to Europe last month, on co-operative diplomacy in his second term.

Mr Bolton is hardly likely to re-invent himself as a born-again multilateralist. But if US policy were to be changed in that direction by the decision-makers in Washington, it would carry more weight with the UN's many critics on the Republican right if it came out of the mouth of Mr Bolton.