Trump chose risky course with North Korea
President Donald Trumps letter canceling his June 12 summit with North Koreas Kim Jong Un is a coy piece of manipulation flattering and threatening Kim at the same time. Its like the letters people send when breaking up a romance that hasnt quite ripened. The words seem heartfelt, even as they stick in the knife.
l was very much looking forward to being there with you, Trump writes in the tone of a wounded suitor. Sadly, based on the tremendous anger and open hostility displayed in your most recent statement, I feel it is inappropriate, at this time, to have this long-planned meeting.
And then the sober warning, responding to North Koreas taunting challenge this week to meet us at a meeting room or encounter us at a nuclear-to-nuclear showdown. Answered Trump: You talk about nuclear capabilities, but ours are so massive and powerful that I pray to God they will never have to be used.
On balance, Trump may have been wise to back away from a meeting that he had seemed in recent weeks to want too much and to have prepared for too little and to let Kim think for a while about the great prosperity and wealth hes giving up in retaining his nuclear weapons. But Trump, as usual, has chosen a risky course. His letter could produce a renewed confrontation that would be damaging for U.S. relations with South Korea and China, in addition to resuming the brinksmanship with Pyongyang.
This opens the door for Kim to play a much more complicated and nuanced game than we had wanted. Weve dealt ourselves out, warns Robert Carlin, a former CIA and State Department analyst who has visited Pyongyang more than 30 times.
https://www.heraldnet.com/opinion/trump-chose-risky-course-with-north-korea/