The Koam-Tapchon marine railway bridge is opened to traffic on May 30, 2018, during a ceremony on its completion in this photo from the North’s Korean Central News Agency. The bridge, built in the country’s eastern coastal area, is aimed at developing the railway transport and fishing industry, the report said. (Yonhap)
Maybe this what the dispute was really about in regards to almost having the summit cancelled, not denuclearization, but agreeing on what burger joint to put in North Korea: 😉
A new CIA intelligence assessment concludes North Korea has no plans to relinquish its nuclear weapons program even though denuclearization is the centerpiece of the summit tentatively planned for next month, NBC News reported Tuesday.
But North Korean leader Kim Jong Un may be willing to bring a U.S. burger outlet to Pyongyang as a show of good faith, the assessment suggests. [USA Today]
You can read more at the link, but if a US fast food joint it opened up next to Kim Jong-un’s palace that may end up shortening his life expectancy considering his already extreme weight.
As I have long said the long term goal of the Kim regime is to get USFK off of the peninsula and the ongoing nuclear negotiations appear to be trying to advance that effort:
Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha, left, and Defense Minister Song Young-moo talk to each other while walking toward a Cheong Wa Dae room, Tuesday, to join in a Cabinet meeting chaired by President Moon Jae-in. / Yonhap
Joint military exercises between South Korea and the United States are likely to become a key topic at the denuclearization talks between the U.S. and North Korea.
The Rodong Sinmun, the North’s mouthpiece newspaper, published an op-ed article claiming the drills as a major source of security concern in Northeast Asia.
“It is an international practice for two negotiating sides to refrain from any military activities,” the article said.
“When the U.S. deploys strategic nuclear weapons during the joint military exercises with South Korea, all the ongoing dialogue momentum will return to the original state.” (…..)
The regime last week threatened to cancel a planned summit between Trump and Kim, expressing anger over the Max Thunder joint air force exercises.
As the drills ended their two-week run last week, the regime ramped up criticism of the Ulchi Freedom Guardian (UFG) exercises between Seoul and Washington, annually held sometime around August.
“South Korea is making a fuss that it does not have plans to downsize UFG drills in August,” the propaganda newspaper said. It said the exercises are the root cause of breaking up peace and stability on the peninsula, urging their suspension in line with the ongoing dialogue momentum. [Korea Times]
You can read more more at the link, but cancelling Key Resolve, UFG, and other joint exercises will impact the readiness of USFK. These drills are especially important in a theater where many of the US troops rotate out in a year causing constant turnover. North Korea appears to be trying to get the ROK to advocate to the US to cancel the upcoming UFG exercise. If the ROK pushes hard to cancel the exercise this will likely cause tension within the US-ROK alliance which is what the Kim regime wants.
The Butcher of the Cheonan is to visit New York and meet with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. It seems whenever Kim Jong-un is serious about getting something done this is the thug he sends:
Kim Yong-chol
U.S. President Donald Trump confirmed Tuesday that North Korean vice chairman Kim Yong-chol is heading to New York as part of ongoing preparations for his talks with the communist country’s leader.
“We have put a great team together for our talks with North Korea. Meetings are currently taking place concerning Summit, and more. Kim Young Chol, the Vice Chairman of North Korea, heading now to New York,” Trump said in a message posted on Twitter.
Calling the official’s visit to the U.S. a “solid response to my letter,” Trump said “thank you.”
Kim Yong-chol arrived in Beijing earlier in the day en route to the United States, with sources saying he is expected to meet with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to get prepared for the high-stakes talks between Trump and Kim Jong-un. [Yonhap]
ROK Heads may remember that when Kim Yong-chol visited South Korea protesters tried to block his entry at the DMZ, but were foiled by ROK authorities. Human Rights group should go and protest against this guy in New York.
I would think that North Korea would be jubilant if a deal was agreed to with President Trump that leaves them with a Pakistan like nuclear arsenal:
So are there any models of “rogue” regimes with nuclear programs that might appeal to North Korea? The answer is yes. But, unfortunately, it’s a state that kept its nuclear deterrent intact: Pakistan. If Pyongyang is weighing up two possible futures—Libya vs. Pakistan—it’s not much of a choice.
Pakistan began to seriously pursue nuclear weapons in the 1970s, motivated by a desire to deter its more powerful rival India, as well as match India’s nuclear capability. The Pakistani politician Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who later became prime minister, claimed, “If India builds the bomb, we will eat grass or leaves—even go hungry—but we will get one of our own.” In 1998, on a clear and bright day in the Chagai district, Pakistan carried out a series of nuclear tests. Pakistan’s chief scientific officer said “All praise be to Allah” and pushed the button, causing the mountain to shake in a vast explosion.
In 2016, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientistsestimated that Pakistan had 130 to 140 warheads and predicted that it would nearly double its arsenal by 2025. Islamabad could deliver nuclear weapons by medium-range ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, F-16 fighters, and tactical systems for short-range use on the battlefield. [The Atlantic]
You can read more at the link, but President Trump has said that he wants North Korea to follow the South Korea model of using nuclear technology for peaceful purposes. So the Pakistan model is likely off the table. However, if the Pakistan model is being considered, from the US perspective leaving North Korea with a short range nuclear arsenal is in the US’s interest since these missiles cannot target the US mainland, Hawaii, Alaska, and Guam.
However, the Pakistan model would not solve the issue of proliferation. Strict inspections would be needed to ensure nuclear technology is not being proliferated. What kind of inspections will the Kim regime agree to? The other major issue with the Pakistan model is would the North Koreans agree to give up medium range missiles that could target Japan? I just don’t see the President Trump agreeing to any deal that will allow the North Koreans to keep nuclear weapons to target Japan with, not only because they are a US ally, but because of the multiple US military bases in Japan.
The final issue I foresee is trying to get a Pakistan model deal passed through the Senate as a binding treaty. I don’t think President Trump could get enough support of such a deal in the Senate especially in a Congressional election year.
I wonder how much effort the Moon administration is putting into stopping these phone calls from Kim regime operatives to North Korean defectors?:
As North Korea makes increasingly aggressive calls for the return of a group of restaurant workers in China who defected en masse to South Korea in 2016, it has come to light that the regime is also making efforts to persuade other defectors in South Korea to return to the North.
“Anti-espionage agents from the provincial Ministry of State Security offices are calling up defectors in South Korea in an effort to get them to return to the country,” said a Ryanggang Province-based source to Daily NK on May 23.
“The agents tell the defectors point-blank that they will be met by agents in China and even give them telephone numbers to call once the defectors arrive in China. They are trying to bring them back to the country.”
A “Lieutenant Colonel Choe” of the Ryanggang Province Ministry of State Security (MSS) Anti-Espionage Unit is calling defectors living in South Korea on a frequent basis, according to the source. The agent tells defectors that “they will not be asked about their past history and will be guaranteed the same position they had when they left the country.” He also tells them that they should “[…] relax and return home. The motherland will always accept you if you decide to come back.”
The Ryanggang Province source provided details about how MSS agents are conducting calls with the defectors in South Korea. When a defector reaches out to brokers in North Korea to send money back to their family, sometimes these brokers are arrested by the MSS.
The MSS becomes aware of defectors the brokers have had contact with during the interrogation process and collects information such as their phone numbers. The MSS agents then directly contact the defectors to threaten or entice them to return to North Korea. A defector who was contacted by MSS agents recalled that, “[The agents] were really persistent in sending text messages and making phone calls.” [The Daily NK]
The North Koreans don’t need economic aid for the US considering that President Moon is figuratively willing to drive the Bank of Korea armored truck directly to Kim Jong-un’s palace. They just need the US to drop the sanctions on the Kim regime so the payoff aid can be legally delivered to North Korea:
North Korea on Sunday fumed at U.S. reports that the country is seeking economic assistance from the United States in return for denuclearization.
The ruling Workers’ Party’s official newspaper Rodong Sinmun commented that Fox News TV, CBS and CNN were “as impudent as to make rubbish that if the DPRK meets the requirements of the U.S., it can get ‘large-scale non-governmental economic aid.'”
“This is nonsense of hack media on the payroll of power,” according to its commentary carried in an English dispatch by the state-run Korean Central News Agency.
“U.S. media is still building up public opinion that the DPRK comes to the negotiating table with the U.S. in a hope to get ‘economic aid,'” the report said using the initial of the North’s full name, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. “We can not but make the fact clear. It is the U.S. that asked for DPRK-U.S. talks first,” the North claimed.
“As far as the ‘economic aid’ … is concerned, the DPRK has never expected it.” [Yonhap]
You can read more at the link, but most of the US media is completely uninformed about North Korea
BREAKING: A team of U.S. officials led by Sung Kim crossed into North Korea today to hold summit preparation talks, despite uncertainty surrounding the June 12 Trump-Kim meeting. The North Korean delegation is led by vice foreign minister Choe Son Hui. https://t.co/eLPZiB68cCpic.twitter.com/XwRwNqYtxo
The South Korean ambassador to the US, Cho Yoon-je recently published an article in the Washington Post pretty much saying this time things are different with North Korea:
Cho Yoon-je
When North Korea announced last Wednesday that it was postponing high-level inter-Korea talks and might reconsider taking part in the planned summit with President Trump, pundits were quick to say North Korea was up to its old tricks. But my memory went back to a different moment. I recalled my days as a young economist at the International Monetary Fund in the late 1980s when Washington was debating the gloomy prospects of the Cold War. It was impossible to imagine that anything like peace could emerge during that dark time.
Today, the same pall is hovering over Washington regarding the seemingly dimmed hopes for the denuclearization of North Korea. One Korean expert pointed out to me that such skepticism in Washington is based on long-established habit; the world has tried everything, he noted, and Pyongyang has not given up its nuclear weapons no matter what. It is hard to argue against this viewpoint given North Korea’s record. And yet I would still contend that this time is different. That is why we must still give hope a chance, even though there are miles to go and the road will be bumpy.
Back in the 1980s, many in the West initially regarded the Soviet Union’s policies of economic reform and political openness, as well as its stated intention of nuclear arms reduction, with pronounced skepticism. Now we feel that same pessimism once again, this time in respect to North Korea. Some are advising Seoul and Washington that they should, instead, recall the opportunities that presented themselves in the second half of the 1980s. The grim history of the Cold War did not stop Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and President Ronald Reagan from reaching for a chance at peace. [Washington Post]
You can read the rest at the link, but so far I have not seen anything different from the Kim regime so far. Everything so far has been spectacle and little substance which about sums up all past negotiations and agreements with the Kim regime.
Also an important fact that Mr. Cho failed to mention in his article is Reagan’s famous words of “Trust by Verify”. I seriously doubt the Trump administration is going to sign up for any denuclearization deal with the Kim regime that does not have strong verification protocols. When I see the Kim regime agree to nuclear material to be removed from the country and the Yongbyon nuclear plant irreversibly shut down under the supervision of international inspectors then I will say this time is different.
