What do I think about today's joint agreement? It has zero practical value. The U.S. could have extracted serious concessions, but it was not done. N.Korea will be emboldened and the U.S. got nothing: https://t.co/FXkkURMnpC
I totally agree with Dr. Lankov that the recent Kim-Moon Inter-Korean Summit was more marketing and hype than actual substance:
Andrei Lankov
It was, frankly, quite striking to see the tidal wave of unwarranted optimism in South Korean media that accompanied the April 27 summit.
To be more precise, this tidal wave began to rise shortly before the summit actually took place, and reached a truly remarkable level after its (modest and predictable) results were announced.
To a very large extent, this optimism has been deliberately manufactured by the South Korean bureaucracy. The Moon administration has spared no expense creating the impression that a historical breakthrough was made at Panmunjom.
These marketing efforts are eagerly supported by left-leaning media outlets, with the Hankyoreh Sinmun and Kyonghyang Sinmun being arguably the most vocal participants in this state-led enthusiasm building campaign. (…………)
One op-ed author, for example, assured his readers that in the near future, they will be able to take “the unification train” from Busan all the way to Moscow and Paris.
Another contributor shared his dreams about hiking in the North Korean mountains and buying freshly boiled corn from locals and assured readers that now, after this supposed breakthrough, these dreams are certainly about to come true very soon.
It has even been suggested that the architects of this supposed breakthrough should be considered as candidates for the Nobel Peace Prize.
These flood of naivety and self-imposed amnesia might sound comical, but there are good reasons why the Moon administration is working so hard to manufacture this optimism and to maintain it at a sufficiently high level. [NK News]
You can read more at the link, but the Moon administration is building this hype like I have previously posted about, to influence President Trump during his upcoming summit with Kim Jong-un. They need to get Trump on board with the Great Charade of 2018 and get him to also pretend that things are going to be different this time and that the North Koreans really do mean to denuclearize.
Rebuilding Kim’s image with the Inter-Korean Summit was part of this effort. The upcoming demolition of the nuclear test site will be the next dramatic optic of little substance that will happen before the Kim-Trump summit. If President Trump sticks to his demands of denuclearization with strict inspections before dropping sanctions than the Great Charade of 2018 will likely implode and Moon will likely blame Trump for its failure instead of the real source of the peninsula’s problems, Kim Jong-un.
In just a week, the situation in Korea has made yet another U-turn. It is quite normal to wonder “why is all this happening?” The answer is simple: like it or not, "Maximum pressure" seems to have worked – at least for now https://t.co/5MxL2bJLTX
A ROK Drop favorite Dr. Andrei Lankov has an article published in NK News that once again advocates for a “freeze deal” with North Korea:
Andrei Lankov
Of course, it is politically impossible to be excessively frank about such a plan, as the admission that North Korea is a de facto nuclear state would damage international non-proliferation efforts and bring about a tidal wave of virtue signaling behavior from U.S. hard-liners, including many legislators.
To cushion these problems, a freeze deal will have to be presented as merely the “first step on the long and winding road to North Korea’s denuclearization” which will surely happen at some point in a rather distant future.
So far, the idea of a freeze, while widely discussed among the mid-level officials, remains a taboo at the higher levels of the U.S. bureaucracy. This is vital: this is exactly the levels where such decisions have to be made.
This author is skeptical about the immediate prospects of a freeze. It will take some time (probably, years) before U.S. decision makers get over their natural tendency to deny the unpleasant truth. Nonetheless, serious discussion of a freeze as a theoretical possibility has already begun, and numerous opponents of this idea have already made good arguments about what is problematic about such a plan.
Unfortunately, in spite of being a long-time proponent of the freeze idea, I cannot help but admit that many of their arguments are correct, but on balance, there are still valid reasons to accept the freeze solution as a deal which, while flawed and imperfect, is still better than its alternatives. [NK News]
You can read more at the link, but as I have said before I think any freeze deal should include robust inspections and the risk of a retaliatory bombing strike if it is not complied with. The risk of war on the peninsula by noncompliance by the Kim regime would give motivation to the Chinese to make sure the Kim regime is complying with the deal.
A ROK Drop favorite Andrei Lankov explains why Russia is going to attempt to water down United Nations sanctions on North Korea or veto them all together and it has nothing to do with Putin taking an anti-US position:
Andrei Lankov
Vladimir Putin was right when he recently said that even if North Koreans have to eat grass, they will not surrender nuclear weapons (of course, in North Korea the people who make decisions on nuclear weapons are far removed from the people who would have no choice but to eat grass).
However, there is the probability that a really harsh sanctions regime will eventually provoke a grave political crisis and revolution in North Korea: instead of eating grass, the people will rebel.
For American observers, who will watch enthusiastic TV reports about a North Korean revolution in safety, this development, as long as it does not trigger a region-wide war, will be welcome. After all, regime collapse will bring about the complete solution of the North Korean nuclear issue, the U.S.’s overwhelming concern.
However, Russia and China, inconveniently located on the border with North Korea, have reasons to be unenthusiastic about prospects of a Syria-like or Libya-like situation, anarchy and civil war in a nuclear-armed country nearby. For Moscow – and, for that matter, for Beijing – a collapsing North Korea is a greater threat than a nuclear one, however bad a nuclear North Korea is. [NK News]
You can read the rest of the analysis at the link.
Whenever noted North Korean scholar Dr. Andrei Lankov writes something I take notice. In his latest op-ed published in Bloomberg he is advocating that the incoming Trump administration negotiate a deal for a nuclear and missile freeze with North Korea:
Finally, some observers seem to hold out hope that Trump, a self-described “great” dealmaker, might be able to talk Kim out of his nukes in direct negotiations. This, too, is a futile idea. U.S. and North Korean interests are fundamentally incompatible. North Korean leaders fear that giving up their nukes would leave them dangerously vulnerable; they only too well remember what happened to Moammar Qaddafi after he negotiated away his nuclear program.
The truth is that for more than a decade, there’s been no real chance of fully eliminating the North’s nuclear program. Even now, though, the U.S. could negotiate something better than the current situation: a verifiable freeze on nuclear and missile testing, before North Korea develops an ICBM.
Of course, Kim isn’t going to restrain himself for free. In return, he will demand many things — a hefty aid package, above all, but also political concessions, including a formal peace treaty. No doubt his regime will probably try to cheat.
The opponents of such a compromise will describe it as a terrible precedent, even blackmail — and they may be right. Unlike Iran, North Korea will remain a nuclear power even after signing such a deal. But the alternatives — either a major war that drags in the U.S. and China, or a fully armed North with the proven capacity to attack the U.S. mainland — are worse. As long as there’s still a chance of striking such a compromise, the new U.S. President should be doing everything he can to seize it. [Bloomberg]
I do not see the point of a nuclear freeze in return for a bunch of free goodies to the Kim regime in return for something that even Dr. Lankov admits they will try and cheat on. Plus by agreeing to sign a peace treaty with North Korea that puts into question the entire existence of the US-ROK alliance which is why the Kim regime has been pressing so hard for it. The Kim regime knows they have no chance of reunifying the peninsula on their terms as long as the US-ROK alliance is in place.
It seems to me a peace treaty should not be part of a freeze deal and whatever deal that is signed should include robust inspections and the risk of a retaliatory bombing strike if it is not complied with. The risk of war on the peninsula by noncompliance by the Kim regime would give motivation to the Chinese to make sure the Kim regime is complying with the deal.
Via a reader tip comes an opinion piece from ROK Drop favorite Andrei Lankov in regards to why China is so vehemently opposed to the deployment of the THAAD battery to South Korea:
However, such a hard blow is unlikely to ever be delivered by China. This is because extreme pressure is more likely to bring about regime collapse than denuclearization, and regime collapse is not what the Chinese leaders want to see (an anarchy in a nuclear state nearby is not their idea of stability and success). And at any rate, the Chinese losses from such a scenario will be greater than the problems created by THAAD deployment. Minor pressure, however, is not going to solve the nuclear problem and hence it will not lead to THAAD re-deployment elsewhere.
In this context, China therefore acts reasonably: it does not increase its pressure on North Korea, but rather penalizes South Korea for THAAD deployment. Obviously, it is being done in expectation that a sufficiently persistent form of pressure will eventually make the South Korean government – well, perhaps, next one – re-consider its position on THAAD.
After all, being a democracy, South Korea is relatively susceptible to outside pressures. China looms large in the South Korean economy, so informal sanctions – which are very easy to introduce for the Chinese leaders – will have a noticeable impact on the lives of the common South Koreans who, unlike their northern brethren, can vote and who also have many other means to push the government in the direction they (rightly or wrongly) see as conducive to their interests. [NK News]
I recommend reading the whole thing at the link. Mr. Lankov is right about what he covers in his analysis. However, I think he did miss one thing. In my opinion the Chinese know very well that THAAD is not a risk to their strategic missile deterrent. Instead they see this an opportunity to create a wedge between the US and the ROK. A weakened US-ROK alliance is in China’s national interest which the reversing of course on THAAD has the potential of creating.
