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Good News on Korea Talks
By maudeaster on 2018-04-20 10:29:23
Lots of good news on Korea talks! This week President Trump revealed he had
sent Secretary of State nominee Mike Pompeo to North Korea to meet with President Kim Jung-Un to prepare for a Trump-
Kim summit. Pompeo confirmed the earlier Chinese information that North Korea is willing to negotiate about its nuclear
program, dates and locations were discussed, and Trump expressed enthusiasm about the progress made. It is also clear that
South Korea is working hard with North Korea to clear away obstacles to a successful agreement. Just today The New York
Times reported an announcement by South Korean President Moon Jae-In that North Korea has dropped a long-held demand
that American troops be removed from South Korea as part of a peace deal. The Pentagon has for decades resisted North
Korean demands for US troop withdrawal, so this removes an important barrier to a peace agreement. Moon Jae-In also
assured Washington that “North Korea is expressing a willingness to denuclearize
completely. “North Korea, he said, would agree to denuclearize in return for normalized ties with the United States, aid to
North and South Korea will use their summit meeting next week to announce e their shared intentions “to ease military
tensions and end a military confrontation”. Kim Jung-Un and Moon Jae-In seem to be moving forward skillfully to create a
path for the US and China, the signatories to the 1953 armistice agreement, to join them in formally ending ongoing military
hostilities — seen so clearly i in the potentially disastrous nuclear confrontation between Trump and Kim just a few months
t in ending military confrontation of course goes back to the division of the peninsula itself in
1945. _JSince then, both sides of the dividing line have lived with the threat of military conflict
hanging over them — and both have felt the need to devote huge amounts to military preparedness. The Korean leaders,
North and South, seem clear that what they want now is a non-aggression commitment, by each other and by the US and
China, to prevent both nuclear and conventional conflicts on their soil. A peace treaty to finally officially end the Korean
War hostilities, committed to by the US, China and both Koreas seems like the needed first step. The US and South Korea
also want a clear commitment from the North to end its nuclear program, and fortunately there are many bargaining chips
the US can use to encourage the North’s agreement to a rapid, verifiable process: ending the provocative US-South Korean
huge annual war games, removing US nuclear-capable bombers and naval vessels from and around the Korean peninsula
and ending sanctions against the North. The key to success will be Trump’s recognition that negotiations must be a win for
both parties. Also critical will be Trump’s willingness to stay committed to the talks. Already, the same day he praised the
Pompeo meeting with Kim Jung-Un and welcomed the North-South progress toward a peace agreement, by evening Trump
had announced a threat to boycott a meeting with Kim or walk out of it if he wasn’t satisfied — hardly conducive to building
North Korea’s confidence in the negotiations process. The other critical question is who will be advising Trump during this
process. It is somewhat ironic to see Pompeo playing a meeting-preparation role, since just last summer he advocated the
need for regime change in North Korea. Pompeo is playing the productive diplomat now — while he hopes
to dispel opposition in the Senate to his nomination as Secretary of State. Senators are
concerned not only about his record as a foreign policy hawk, but also about his repeated hostile and inflammatory
comments about Muslims and his opposition to the fruits of previous diplomacy — including the Paris Climate Agreement
and the Iran Nuclear Agreement. I fear that if the Senate did confirm him, he would shed his role supporting a Trump-Kim
meeting and revert to his hawkish self, advising Trump to make unrealistic demands of the North Koreans. The other voice
in Trump’s ear to fear is that of John Bolton, Trump’s new National Security Advisor. As
Michael Fuchs pointed out in Zhe Guardian _, last spring Bolton advocated preventive military strikes on North Korea.
Secretary of Defense Mattis warned that even a conventional military strike would be “catastrophic” and cause “probably
the worst kind of fighting in most people’s lifetimes”. Pentagon estimates were of 20,000 fatalities a day in South Korea if a
conventional conflict were started. The Trump-Kim meeting is on track for now to take place in late May or early June. A
successful agreement would be a major foreign policy coup for Trump at a time he surely needs a distraction from escalating
legal problems. Let’s hope that keeps the president focused on making the negotiations a win for all parties!
