The Korean Caper

Foreign policy from the American perspective, in the era of Trump, requires the merging of two often incongruous points: what we see and what we know. It begs the question, how reliable are our eyes and ears?

Yesterday we saw a form of détente being exercised between North and South Korea. Today we will hear about a significant role the US (and more specifically D. Trump) played in putting together what is being billed as the end of the 70 year old Korean War. Such an accomplishment, with additional overtones of reducing future armed conflict on the Korean peninsula is of a level that starts Nobel Peace Prize speculation.

We also saw Mike Pompeo pictured with Kim Jong-un last month. What was going on there? It all looks so…well, progressive. This is made especially true following the reintroduction into the American fear machine of nuclear holocaust, made particularly vivid by videos of Hawaiian citizens running amuck in paradise.

Okay then…so what do we know?

We know that North Korea has survived for three generations as a fully authoritarian regime. Kim is viewed by the majority of North Koreans essentially as a deity, as was his father and grandfather.  We know that even with a compromised economy it has been able to successfully develop both nuclear weapons and delivery systems. 

We know that since the end of military conflict in the early 1950s the US has been the target of national hostility, loathing, and a useful tool for North Korean national unity. America is to Kim what the Jews were to Hitler.

We know that Kim is 35 years old (or 34 or 36 depending on the source) and it is reasonable to believe that he has every intention of keeping his job until death, as has been the family tradition.  He could easily have 50 years left to his term, so whatever game he may be playing you can assume it’s the long game.

We also know he is ruthless, given the public assassinations and known political gulags. Benevolence is not in his wheelhouse. Just ask the Warmbier family. It is meaningless that he likes to listen to electropop or watch basketball.

We know that the Trump administration has demonstrated a type of political pragmatism that more resembles pinball ambiguity than pinpoint precision.  The haphazard turnover in Administration leadership is nowhere more evident than in the State Department with the Tillerson efforts to completely dismantle it like an unprofitable corporate acquisition.

We know that child-like rhetoric has been Trump’s response to North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic successes. We also know that Trump is playing a short game (a fact that’s essentially true for most in American politics), and given his erratic behavior toward the legal woes he faces, it’s likely his preference is a very short game.

So if what we see doesn’t mesh with what we know, where does that take us?

Here should be the givens: Kim Jong-un is not going to denuclearize his regime. It is a carrot that will never get within a yard of the donkey’s nose. It makes absolutely no sense for an authoritarian government to give up the only ace in its hand.

What Kim wants is the US out of South Korea, expand his relationship with China, Russia, and, probably, Vietnam to keep the US out of the Yellow Sea and much of the Sea of Japan. He wants reduced influence by the US over South Korea and he can wait years, maybe decades to make it happen.

 By normalizing relations (trade, exchange etc.) with South Korea and dangling unification along with denuclearization he is hoping to get South Korea to be the landlord to evict the Americans.  Trump, with his game limited to a couple of years at best (maybe far less…go Mueller), will jump on any bandwagon which he thinks will make him a candidate for Nobel status.

As incongruous as it might appear, it may end up being the right course of action.

The only weapon I believe to be useful in undermining Kim Jong-un’s iron hold over the North Korean people (& policy) is prosperity.  Perhaps in post-Trump America we can figure a way to be a leading force in advancing North Korea’s economy instead of the continual militarily adversarial position we have taken for 70 years.  

It is obvious Korean unification will never happen until the two Koreas look essentially alike. Let’s work toward making them both look like South Korea.