The Trump-Kim Summit
Only a year ago, no one dreamt that a summit meeting between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un was even remotely possible. This time last year, North Korean state media was busy hurling invectives at Trump and threatening the US with its nuclear weapons while Trump was referring to Kim as “the little rocket man.”
Yet, a summit meeting of the two sworn enemies was exactly what happened on Tuesday last week, June 12 when Trump and Kim met in Singapore in the first ever meeting between leaders of the two countries since the Korean War of the 1950s. The two countries have been ideological and strategic enemies since the end of the Second World War. While the communist Workers Party of Korea led by Kim Jong-un’s grandfather Kim Il-Sung took control of the northern Korea with the support of China, anti-communist forces took control of the southern part with US support. A North Korean attempt to forcibly unify the peninsula led to the Korea War of 1950-53 in which millions died. The war however ended with an armistice but not a peace treaty.
Matters seemingly worsened last year when North Korea exploded its first hydrogen bomb and successfully tested its Hwasong-15 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), which it said is capable of hitting mainland USA. In response Trump tightened sanctions against North Korea and threatened to visit it with “fire and fury such as the world has never seen.” Things suddenly got better earlier this year when the two Koreas’ leaders held a summit meeting and Kim extended an invitation to meet Trump. Though there were many ups and downs, the two finally met last week.
The US’ main aim at the summit was to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula. Kim however sees nukes as his best guarantee against a US attack. North Korea also stated conditions for jettisoning its nukes. They are, US and South Korea should not locate nukes in the vicinity; the two countries should not deploy nukes during their annual joint military exercises; the US should not attack North Korea with nuke or conventional weapons; US should establish full diplomatic ties with DPRK and also that the 1953 Armistice Agreement which ended the Korean War should become a full-fledged peace treaty.
No side fully got what it wanted from the summit. The joint statement issued by Trump and Kim agreed to provide “security guarantees” for North Korea, new peaceful relations, reaffirmation of the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, recovery of soldiers’ remains and follow-up negotiations between high-level officials. Trump also sweetened the deal by canceling this year’s US-South Korea joint military exercise. It is not however clear where things go from here, since there were no explicit agreements on any of those issues and no time frames for achieving them.
Still, the world is breathing more easily after last week’s US-DPRK summit. The heightened tension and rhetoric between the two mercurial leaders had put the world at great risk of a nuke incident. With the two sworn enemies now becoming chummy if strange friends, that risk is greatly reduced even if the summit does not lead to lasting peace, disarmament and ultimate reunification of the Korean peninsula.
It is not however clear where things go from here, since there were no explicit agreements on any of those issues and no time frames for achieving them