Aftermath of the Second Trump-Kim Summit

The second Trump-Kim summit in Hanoi last week ended without an agreement or joint declaration from the two sides. In fact, the DPRK did not agree to any concessions, though they received international recognition for meeting with the United States, cancelled ROKUS joint military exercises, and a proverbial “Get out of Jail” card for the imprisonment, torture, and death of US citizen Otto Warmbier. The latter prompted the Warmbier family to speak out against President Trump’s comments following the summit.

Yesterday, White House national security adviser John Bolton appeared on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” Bolton acknowledged that the DPRK is not offering CVID, rather they are presenting a narrowly constructed offer of dismantling the Yongbyon reactor and some of their plutonium reprocessing and uranium enrichment programs. In exchange, the DPRK wanted relief from nearly all sanctions imposed since 2016. These positions provided a road block in the working-level negotiations leading up to the summit, which begs the question: Why did the two leaders meet at all? Of note, Bolton stated, ” The president’s view is he gave nothing away. That’s- that’s what matters, not my view.”

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also gave an interview to USA Today where he was ineffective at damage control. Pompeo stated, “The North Korean regime is responsible for the death Otto Warmbier and the humanitarian violations that are continuing to take place.” Further, he had no response to DPRK Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho’s statement that “our proposal will never be changed.” This second summit seems to have been a clear win for Kim Jong Un and reflects the fact that no future summits should take place before the two sides reach agreements during working-level negotiations.

Without CVID, any peace declaration on the Korean Peninsula is meaningless. President Moon Jae In has staffed his administration with pro-North Korean activists of the 80s, and is himself soft on the DPRK. Any peace declaration, without full denuclearization of the North, sets the stage for dismantling the security that the US nuclear umbrella provides the ROK. Moreover, the readiness of ROK troops, already diminished by shortened enlistments, will be degraded by cancelled joint exercises. Meanwhile, the Moon Administration has displayed enthusiasm for providing the DPRK with cash in the name of “inter-Korean cooperation.” All of the above exists in a context where the North continues their training cycles, nuclear enrichment programs, and biological and chemical weapons development. President Obama told President Trump that North Korea would be the most urgent problem he faced. Sadly, President Trump appears not to have developed a strategy for facing this problem.