I am not enough of an internal North Korea politics expert to know why Kim is doing what Kim's doing. But from a 30,000 foot IR perspective, I have just a couple of ideas.
/1
/1
First, what does it cost Kim to do any of this? Nothing. He has faced down the United States, given Trump the finger, matched our rhetoric, and in return he's....kept his nuclear arsenal and gotten a summit out of it. A win by any definition for North Korea. /2
Kim has solidified his family's legacy, and now it's time to get rid of those sanctions. So he placates China, and reaches out to SK...again, offering *nothing* in return but vague "one day, we'll all be 'denuclearized' together" promises. /3
In one swoop, Kim has done all this:
- raised himself to "international leader" stature
- gotten the US to treat him like a peer
- kept his nuclear program
- cracked open the chance for ending at least some sanctions
- gotten the royal treatment in SK without involving the US
/4
- raised himself to "international leader" stature
- gotten the US to treat him like a peer
- kept his nuclear program
- cracked open the chance for ending at least some sanctions
- gotten the royal treatment in SK without involving the US
/4
If, on top of all this, he's ending his testing because he blew up his own testing site accidentally, than it's a great time to take a breather.
So far, all I see here is gain for the Norks.
The gain for everyone else is: no war in Korea, which is great. /5
So far, all I see here is gain for the Norks.
The gain for everyone else is: no war in Korea, which is great. /5
But to attribute this to tough US diplomacy strikes me as reversing causality. (Again, I'm willing to be shown evidence from Korea experts here.) NK has weathered the US storm with a defiant GFY on nukes. Now they can afford to look magnanimous. /6
And since the US leadership and policies are so unstable, Kim's able to make the case that this should be an "in the family" arrangement in Asia that excludes the kooky Americans. That's how it seems to me, anyhoo. /7x
