I am near my limit on the idiocy I’m witnessing and nothing is more idiotic than the bromance between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un. The only positive thing I can say about Trump’s brief (one-minute) visit to North Korea is that Kim may be less inclined to take reckless and provocative actions that could lead to war or even the use of nuclear weapons if he thinks he has some kind of decent relationship with the American president.
Given the unequal balance of power between the United States and North Korea, however, this strategy makes little sense. Neville Chamberlain had some solid reasons for trying to maintain some kind of relationship with Hitler, even if it required him to make concessions and sell out allies. If war broke out on the continent, the United Kingdom wasn’t in a great position to respond. It was compelling then to go the extra mile for peace given the likely consequences of war, and it’s equally compelling now, but it seems like North Korea is that one that should be making concessions in this case rather than the other way around.
Also, do you know what Neville Chamberlain did not do in Munich?
He did not invite Hitler to visit him in London.
After about a minute on officially hostile territory, Mr. Trump escorted Mr. Kim back over the line into South Korea, where the two briefly addressed a scrum of journalists before slipping inside the building known as Freedom House for a private conversation along with President Moon Jae-in of South Korea. Mr. Trump said he would invite Mr. Kim to visit him at the White House.
To see how absurd this is, look at the following exchange:
Mr. Trump’s meeting with Mr. Kim in Singapore was the first time sitting American and North Korean leaders had met anywhere, and it produced vague promises to eliminate Pyongyang’s nuclear arsenal. Their second meeting, in Hanoi, ended in failure when Mr. Kim made an offer that fell far short of that.
North Korean officials went dark after the collapse of the talks, refusing to respond to either the Americans or the South Koreans…
…The encounter in Panmunjom had been cast as a brief handshake, not a formal negotiation, but the two ended up together for a little more than an hour. After emerging from their conversation, Mr. Trump said he and Mr. Kim had agreed to designate negotiators to resume talks in the next few weeks, four months after they collapsed at a summit in Hanoi, Vietnam.
The American team will still be headed by Stephen Biegun, the special envoy, but it remained unclear who would be on the North Korean side after reports of a purge of Mr. Kim’s team. Asked later if North Korean negotiators were still alive, Mr. Trump said: “I think they are. I can tell you who the main person is. And I would hope the rest are, too.”
Here we have the president saying that he “hopes” the people we negotiated with in Vietnam are still alive. And yet he wants to roll out the red carpet for this madman for a visit to the White House.
I can’t even document all the insanity involved in this event. I think this kind of sums it up:
Mr. Kim said he knew nothing about a possible meeting until the president’s tweet. “I don’t think this kind of surprise meeting would have happened without the excellent personal relationship between your excellency and me,” he told Mr. Trump in Freedom House.
Mr. Trump expressed relief that Mr. Kim came. “If he didn’t show up, the press was going to make me look very bad,” he said. So you made us both look good, and I appreciate it.”
It’s amazing that Trump think he doesn’t look bad. All I can hope is that something good can come out of this. It’s probably a better strategy than his initial “Fire and Fury” approach, but I am not even certain of that.
What’s your take on South Korea? They’re the ones pushing this. Are they pushing what they genuinely believe to be good policy, or are they pushing this because of Trump’s own behavior (“we gotta percent this maniac’s fire and fury talk”).
Really wish Moon was PM when Obama was in power. Be easier to gauge this.
South Korea is like a cat who has been thrown in a burlap sack with a wolverine by its adoptive parents. They feel betrayed and have no one to trust and just want to avoid being clawed to death.
What do you do about a problem like North Korea? A political revolution was quickly converted into a corrupt family bizness that resembles an organized crime family with an enormous military, whose last couple CEOs seem more than a little kooky, although I know diplomats have described its strategy as quite rational. It has failed of its primary mission to provide a decent material life for 99% of its citizens and survives by militarist blackmail, the only asset it possesses. Of course, it hasn’t helped the mental health of the country/regime that it has been in the unrelenting crosshairs of the US nuclear arsenal for 65+ years.
So now its current Caligula figure is unexpectedly presented with an unqualified, authoritarian-worshiping fool as American prez, one who hasn’t the slightest inclination to follow the norms of diplomacy (or anything else, especially democracy). If the American idiot is willing to engage in meaningless spectacle, imaging that he is “making history” and burnishing his credentials, and the resulting spectacle is decidedly to your propaganda advantage, it’s reasonable for the little Caligula to go on with the show, as long as nothing of consequence is conceded and the fool can be played to some additional advantage.
One supposes it’s better for our unqualified idiot to think that he is making diplomatic history and covering himself in glory than to have him rattling his militarist sabres, trying to figure out what an actual commander in chief and head diplomat would do with Caligula’s little bizness. We’re seeing that dangerous option with Iran. It is a curious dichotomy to observe, supposedly explained by one having nuclear weapons and the other not, but watching the two “strategies” in operation seems frankly incoherent–an intellectual problem that never troubles Der Trumper, of course.
As an unqualified imbecile, Trumper imagines that all that’s needed is for the two competing CEOS to establish a “personal relationship” and that the lower echelons of the companies will then be able to “do the deal”. (He throws out the same delusional nonsense about Iran, but the Revolutionary Guard isn’t playing.) Thus the absurd “Dear Your Excellency” letters and sappy Valentines the American moron brandishes before the braindead corporate media, who are happy to trumpet the “historic” gratuitous entry of Der Trumper into North Korea, the end of which is nothing but more pipedream boobery (“Kim in DC”).
The neocons must be banging their heads against the wall, but at least they have Iran. And the trouble with “personal relationships” and bromances is that, to the extent one “Strong Leader” actually believes in them, the bitterness and anger is all the greater after the (inevitable) break-up….which presumably is what neocons von Bolton and Pompous-eo are waiting for.
So where was Ivanka for this photo op? Or even Clown Bolton? Geez, com’on guys keep up.