Kim Jong-un has reason to be smiling and clapping deferentially to China’s Xi Jinping in Beijing, and enthusiastically at Korea’s K-Pop concert in Pyongyang. North Korea’s hermit went from being labelled a Nuked Pariah to all embracing peacemaker by political pundits, while America and Team Trump are now the Nuked Pariah. Talk about turning the tables, one of which has delectable kimchi – America.
With China back in Kim’s back pocket as China confronts America’s trade-challenge, Kim has astutely – but inaccurately – concluded he can munch at America during his upcoming denuclearization summit with Trump, much the way he has in the past with previous American administrations. That is doubly true now that he has brought China back to the bargaining table, a table no longer just for two. China is now not merely hovering in the background. It is back on the Korean negotiating team coaching Kim.
Kim knows the risks of the negotiating game he has mastered with the U.S., acknowledging that President Trump is a different negotiator than his predecessors. One that can easily shift to a more aggressive military attack if diplomacy fails, especially now that Trump is being coached by hawks advocating a military approach as the only way to denuclearize the North.
The history of failed negotiations between Washington and Pyongyang makes many observers, myself included, skeptical of any significant progress at the Trump-Kim Summit, assuming it takes place.
Denuclearization of the North will not be that easy a concession for Team Trump to extract from Kim. After all, he has promised, stalled and lied in the past and gotten away with it. Now that he has completed his nuclear ambitions, with South Korea groveling for reunification and China on the verge of a trade war with America, why would he give up what he believes is his only insurance policy, especially if China has his back and he believes America is there to chew the political fat while he chews on American kimchi?
Kim believes Trump, like Clinton, Bush and Obama, will compromise on the nuclear disarmament issue in the interest of declaring a “done deal!”
Time will tell if Kim is right and Team Trump is his latest American kimchi delight — or fight.