N. Korea missile test looms in blow to Trump
WASHINGTON — U.S. military and intelligence officials tracking North Korea’s actions by the hour said they are bracing for an imminent test of an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of reaching U.S. shores but appear resigned to the fact that President Donald Trump has no good options to stop it.
If the North goes ahead with the test in the coming days — Pyongyang promised a “Christmas gift” if no progress had been made on lifting sanctions — it would be a glaring setback for Trump’s boldest foreign policy initiative, even as he faces an impeachment trial at home.
U.S. officials are playing down the missile threat, though similar tests two years ago prompted Trump to suggest that “fire and fury,” and perhaps a war, could result.
Trump often cites the suspension of long-range missile and underground nuclear tests for the past two years as evidence that his leader-to-leader diplomacy with the North was working — and that such negotiating skills would persuade the North’s leader, Kim Jong Un, to give up his arsenal.
The administration’s argument has now changed. Should Kim resume tests, U.S. officials said, it will be a sign that he truly feels jammed and has concluded Washington will not lift crushing sanctions on his impoverished nation anytime soon.
Left unaddressed, however, is the challenge that a new missile test would represent and what that would mean for the sanctions strategy. Over the past week, Stephen Biegun, the North Korea envoy who was confirmed by the Senate on Thursday as the next deputy secretary of state, has traveled across East Asia to also try to stem new efforts by Russia and China to weaken those sanctions.
Military officials said there are no plans to try to destroy a missile on the launchpad or intercept it in the atmosphere — steps both Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama considered and rejected. It is unclear if the military’s Cyber Command is still trying to sabotage the launches from afar, as it did under the Obama administration, with mixed results.
Instead, officials said, if the North resumes its missile tests, the Trump administration will turn to allies and again lobby the United Nations Security Council for tightened sanctions — a strategy that has been tried for two decades.
Siegfried Hecker, the former head of the Los Alamos National Laboratory and one of the few Westerners who has seen the North’s uranium production facilities, said he believes the country has fuel for about 38 warheads — double an earlier estimate that he and other scientists and intelligence analysts had issued.
In recent weeks, the North has conducted ground tests of what appear to be new missile engines that Pyongyang said would bolster its “nuclear deterrent,” suggesting that it has little intention of giving up its ability.
“I think part of this may be bluff on their part,” John Bolton, the former national security adviser, said to NPR on Thursday. “They think the president’s desperate for a deal, and if they put an artificial time constraint on it, they may think they’re going to get a better deal. We’ll just have to wait and see.
“But,” he noted, “this is all part of the North Korean playbook.”
A new element of the playbook could be that Kim is calculating that impeachment has weakened Trump, making him more desperate for a policy victory.
With no diplomatic progress between Washington and Pyongyang since the implosion of the last summit in February between Trump and Kim in Hanoi, Vietnam, administration officials are loath to see Trump leap into another face-to-face negotiation. While Trump’s initial diplomatic outreach to Kim raised hopes and generated positive headlines, the president accepted vague language calling for the “denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula” as an ironclad commitment by the North to rid itself of its own weapons.
The expected North Korean escalation will leave Trump with an unpalatable choice. He could reprise his alarming threats of military action from late 2017, infusing the 2020 election year with a sense of crisis, which could cost him votes — and risk real conflict.
Or he could endure the new provocation and double down, betting that greater sanctions could somehow force the North to abandon its decadeslong course toward a nucleartipped missile capable of striking the continental United States.
The recent threats from Kim come as he is preparing for two important political events: a year-end plenary session of the Workers’ Party of Korea and a New Year’s speech. Kim had declared at the start of 2019 that North Korea would not give up a single weapon until the United States lifts sanctions. He then gave Trump a yearend deadline.
Now Kim finds himself empty-handed, unable to stride into the party plenum in triumph or deliver a pronouncement of victory Jan. 1. Backed into a corner, he is trying once again to use his main leverage — the threat of weapons tests or military action — to coerce Trump into sanctions relief, analysts said.
“Things have not worked out the way he has anticipated,” said Jean Lee, a Korea expert at the Wilson Center. “I suspect that he will keep provoking President Trump to compel him to get back to negotiations, but try to avoid overtly confronting him because he wants to leave open an opportunity.”
On Sunday, North Korea said Kim presided over a meeting of the Central Military Commission of the
Workers’ Party, where it said important issues had been discussed “for the sustained and accelerated development of the military capability for self-defense.”
The official Korean Central News Agency said the meeting was called to decide “important organizational and political measures and military steps to bolster” the armed forces “as required by the fastchanging situation.” But it gave no details about the discussions.
In signing a major defense bill Friday evening, Trump put into place new sanctions on North Korea, including the possibility of financial penalties on Russia and China in 120 days if they trade with the North.
“We will be keeping a very close eye on that,” Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., who wrote the provisions, said in an interview. “It would be a huge mistake for the president to waive these sanctions unless he can certify progress on major issues.”
Thus far, Trump is showing little appetite for a return to the “fire and fury” tensions of two years ago.
“I have a very good relationship with Kim Jong Un,” Trump told reporters at the White House this month before adding, in what could prove to be wishful thinking, “I think we both want to keep it that way.”