Recent comments by North Korea’s foreign minister could signal that dictator Kim Jong Un may break his vague pledge to President Trump to dismantle the North’s nuclear weapons and missile programs.
Since Kim, his father and grandfather who ruled before him all have a well-documented history of lying about North Korea’s military aims when it suits their interests, it should not come as a shock that Kim is continuing the proud family tradition.
If so, Northeast Asia could very well be headed right back to the brink of war, with few options left to avoid what could be a dangerous nuclear showdown.
While in Iran on a three-day visit, North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho said Thursday, according to Iranian media: “Although North Korea has agreed on disarmament to deliver on its commitments in negotiations with US, we will preserve our nuclear science as we know that the Americans will not abandon their hostility toward us.”
It is tough to know exactly what such remarks mean. For example, does the North want to keep its nuclear research facilities or power generation capabilities and give up its atomic arsenal? Or does it want to do nothing of substance?
It’s clear that such comments only build on North Korea’s growing dissatisfaction with America’s firm insistence on denuclearization.
That same day that Ri spoke, the North Korean Foreign ministry issued a statement through the Korean Central News Agency. The statement declared that “as long as the U.S. denies even the basic decorum for its dialogue partner and clings to the outdated acting script which the previous administrations have all tried and failed, one cannot expect any progress in the implementation of the DPRK-U.S. joint statement including the denuclearization.”
Huh?
It seems the Kim regime feels that what it calls its recent “goodwill measures” are not being reciprocated by the Trump administration.
These “goodwill measures” include: halting long-range missile and nuclear weapons testing; a questionable claim that the North has dismantled its nuclear test site; and the return of what the North Koreans claim are the remains of 55 members of the U.S. military who died in the Korean War.
None of these steps by North Korea does much to end the threat from the rogue regime’s nuclear bombs and missiles. And since there are about 5,300 American service members still missing and presumed dead in North Korea, the North’s supposed return of the remains of about 1 percent of them 65 years after the Korean War ended must be seen as only a token gesture.
But according to North Korea, the U.S. hasn’t done enough to show its appreciation of the “goodwill measures.” The North says this even though: President Trump’s has suspended important U.S.-South Korean joint military exercises; Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has visited Pyongyang; and President Trump met with Kim at a summit in Singapore in June and showered him with praise.
It seems that Kim is determined to weaken U.S. and international trade sanctions on North Korea and get a formal peace declaration officially ending the Korean War – which was halted with an armistice in 1953. But odds are that even if Kim gets these things he will still find excuses to keep at least some of his nukes.
So if North Korea is backtracking on its promises to end its nuclear weapons program, what should America and our allies do about it?
There are only three possible options at this point – none of which are easy to implement.
Option 1: Take away any excuses Kim could use to hold onto his nuclear program.
There is no harm in declaring the Korean War over. As I have offered in prior commentary for Fox News, President Trump and South Korean President Moon Jae-in could arrange a three-way summit with Kim Jong Un along the Demilitarized Zone separating the Koreas.
There is even the possibility of a modifying the recently announced North-South Korea summit to include President Trump.
At this summit, all three leaders – along with possibly China and the secretary general of the United Nations – could sign a formal declaration ending the Korean War.
If the Trump administration is leery of giving Kim another legitimizing media moment, President Trump could declare the war over in his own way: send out a tweet.
Or, if he wants to follow a more traditional path, the president could issue a more formal statement going into greater length and make a speech or hold a news conference.
If, even after some sort of declaration, North Korea still won’t even talk about denuclearization, it most likely never will. American policy will need to change to reflect this new reality.
Option 2: Toughen sanctions on the North with what some have called “Maximum Pressure 2.0.”
This, simply stated, would be economic sanctions and containment on a much harsher scale than what we have imposed on North Korea up to now.
America and its allies could push for things like: a full-scale oil and natural gas embargo; the immediate withdrawal of all North Korean guest workers (more like slaves) from around the world; and a potential naval blockade to ensure Kim does not try to sell any bombs from his nuclear arsenal or missiles for cash.
Unfortunately, there is a big roadblock in implementing such crippling sanctions: China. With Washington and Beijing in the middle of a nasty trade war, there is very little chance China will ever tighten the screws on Kim, because North Korea could end up being the ultimate bargaining chip.
As over 99 percent of the North’s external trade moves through China in one form or another, a new maximum pressure strategy rises or falls depending on the whims of Beijing.
And you can bet the Chinese will, at the very least, demand the end of the trade war America is now waging – on terms President Trump might find very hard to swallow.
Option 3: Some sort of military strike on Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile sites.
With the North having already built as many as 65 nuclear warheads that can be easily dispersed throughout the country, the chance of destroying all of them in a military strike is nearly zero.
Such a strike would also present a dangerous choice for Kim: would he launch whatever remaining nuclear weapons he had left, knowing that America and its allies may not stop with just one strike?
North Korea has confounded some of the world’s top diplomats for decades. It will likely do so for decades more to come. While no one knows for certain what the future holds on the Korean Peninsula one thing seems clear: the chances of the Kim regime surrendering even one nuclear weapon look pretty bleak.
And sadly but realistically, it may well be that getting the North to agree to the gold standard of complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization is an impossible dream.
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