Trump bets big on China regarding North Korea; payoff is elusive
Despite relaxed rhetoric, policies, president may not move rival to act
WASHINGTON — There is no foreign leader on whom President Donald Trump has placed a bigger bet than Xi Jinping of China.
Trump’s gamble was based on his calculation that Xi, the Chinese president, could put heavy pressure on North Korea to curb its nuclear weapons and missile programs. To secure Xi’s cooperation, the president soft-pedaled his harsh stance on China’s trade practices, and has said little about its adventurism in the South China Sea.
But a growing number of Trump’s aides fear that the bet is not paying off.
China has not significantly tightened the pressure on North Korea since Trump met with Xi in Palm Beach, Fla., in April. Its failure to do more has frustrated White House officials, who plan to raise the issue with their Chinese counterparts at a high-level meeting here June 21.
China’s reluctance to exert its influence in this regard has left the Trump administration with few good options in dealing with the North Korea crisis. And it may lead the administration to try to negotiate with North Korea’s leaders, an approach that did not work for Trump’s predecessors but which he has periodically seemed to embrace.
The White House stepped gingerly in the direction of engagement this week when it sent a senior diplomat to North Korea to obtain the release of Otto Warmbier, a gravely ill U.S. prisoner. The encounter, some former U.S. officials said, could lay the predicate for further such conversations.
But North Korea’s inhumane treatment of Warmbier, 22, complicates the prospects for diplomacy. At an emotional news conference Thursday, Warmbier’s father said his son had been “brutalized and terrorized” during 18 months of captivity; doctors said the son had suffered a severe neurological injury.
Still, current and former officials said the administration was unlikely to shift its strategy because of the mistreatment of a single American, no matter how horrific. The most likely outcome, they said, is that any future contacts with North Korea will be conducted in the utmost secrecy.
“The Trump administration has made it quite clear that this is an all-of-theabove approach,” said Daniel R. Russel, who served as assistant secretary of