One would think that people would be happy that things are looking up in the case of North Korea. Sure, they could be playing their typical games, but this feels rather real. Denuclearizing North Korea would be a big step towards normalization, and this whole process could seriously reduce the tensions between the Koreas, as well as against Japan and the U.S. Sometimes you have to give credit where credit is due. I’m happy to give Obama credit for being in charge when our guys killed Osama Bin Laden. I’m happy to give O credit for going after jihadis and wanting to kill them. Sure, you can’t give all the credit to Trump for what’s going on with North Korea, but he certainly deserves a lot. That’s made the Washington Post’s Colin H. Kahl and Vipin Narang a sad
Trump thinks his North Korea strategy will work on Iran. He’s wrong on both.
On April 24, French President Emmanuel Macron walked into the Oval Office with one overriding mission: persuade President Trump not to ditch the Iran nuclear deal. It looks like he failed. Macron later told reporters that Trump repeated his long-standing view that the nuclear agreement — formally called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action — is “the worst deal ever, it’s a nightmare, it was a catastrophe.†According to Macron, Trump indicated that he would probably fulfill his campaign pledge to scrap the deal when U.S. sanctions relief is due to be renewed May 12. This impression has only been strengthened since.
As troubling as this is, something else Macron said about Trump is even more ominous. “His experience with North Korea is that when you are very tough, you make the other side move and you can try to go to a good deal or a better deal,†Macron recounted. “That’s a strategy of increasing tension.†At a critical juncture for U.S. policy, this suggests that Trump is operating under deeply flawed assumptions about both North Korea and Iran.
What Trump seems to have internalized from North Korea is that threats and “maximum pressure†can force his opponents to negotiate away their nuclear programs on American terms. Yet U.S. pressure is probably not the primary driver of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s willingness to bargain, nor is there much reason to believe that Pyongyang is ready to completely dismantle its nuclear infrastructure. Trump’s faulty assumptions and unrealistic expectations could doom prospects for peacefully deescalating one nuclear standoff — and applying these misguided lessons to Iran could manufacture yet another.
In other words, the two authors are hoping beyond hope that Trump fails. This is Trump Derangement Syndrome to the max. First, Trump’s bluster has, in fact, worked, as it’s been coupled with the good cop routine of S. Korea President Moon Jae-in, and some old school type diplomatic pressure from Japan’s Abe Shinzo. Trump has put pressure on China, getting them to back of on their NK support. Regardless, you get the feeling that these liberal namby pambies want the negotiations to fail. How deranged is that, when it means NK has nuclear program and is belligerent towards South Korea and Japan and the United States, the country these writers live in?
Trump appears to think that he will go to his summit with Kim, scheduled for late May or early June, and be handed the keys to the country’s nuclear kingdom. His campaign of economic sanctions, “fire and fury†threats and “Little Rocket Man†taunts and tweets worked, the White House logic goes; North Korea is now facing deep economic and military vulnerability and is willing to trade its nuclear weapons — its “treasured sword of justice †— for sanctions relief and assurances that the United States won’t attack the country.
But there is no evidence that North Korea feels weak, economically or otherwise. And there is no indication that Kim is willing to surrender his nuclear arsenal for economic benefits, security guarantees or any other incentive Trump might offer.
It’ll be funny when Trump goes to the summit and does things totally unexpected. And you still get the feeling that these Washington Post writers want the summit to fail. This next one is hilarious
Trump’s new national security adviser, John Bolton, continues to call for a “Libya model †of denuclearization for North Korea, where the United States would take custody of the weapons. For Kim, though, Libya illustrates why giving up nuclear weapons is folly. Moammar Gaddafi agreed to surrender his nuclear program in 2003, and the United States and its allies toppled his regime less than a decade later. Kim is unlikely to make the same mistake — and unlike Gaddafi, Kim’s weapons already work. Libya and Trump’s rhetoric on Iran reinforce a critical lesson for North Korea: Nuclear weapons offer a lifetime insurance policy, while security assurances can have expiration dates.
They forget to mention who completely, well, how to say this correctly, totally f*cked it all up. That would be Obama, who decided to join France and England in their attempt to settle things down in Libya to keep the oil flowing to those two nations.
If Trump exits the Iran deal believing he can impose much tougher terms on Tehran, he is deluding himself.
I will say, despite the obvious TDS, they are right when it comes to Iran. There will be no better terms, because the EU weenies do not want better, and Iran knows that all they have to do is bide their time. Obama did a great job in making sure that Iran will be able to get their nuclear weapon in the late 2020’s. But, it also seems that these weenies don’t want there to be a stronger deal with Iran which would truly make it damned near impossible for Iran, the world’s leading supporter of Islamic terrorism, to get nuclear weapons. Because Trump is president.
Many things can still happen, and the summit meeting between President Trump and ‘Supreme Leader’ Kim may fail, may produce no agreement worth having.
But it also might succeed, because the DPRK is desperate. They’ve poured a ton of resources — can’t really say money here, because North Korean money is as worthless as Venezuelan bolivars — and lost much of it in whatever disaster befell their nuclear development and testing site. Those were resources which could have gone to really radical things like feeding the people, and now Little Rocket Man has neither rockets nor food.
Mr Kim is going to want some agricultural help, and that would be a great thing to trade for a real peace agreement and denuclearization.