"Why North Korea’s most recent missile tests are worrying U.S. officials" PBS NewsHour 1/31/2022
Excerpt
SUMMARY: Over the weekend, North Korea tested a missile that flew so far that it could have reached the U.S. Territory of Guam in the South Pacific. It is North Korea’s longest-range test since 2017, and seventh such test this month -- the most launched so closely together in the 10 years of leader Kim Jong Un’s rule. Nick Schifrin reports.
"South Korea’s foreign minister on US role in denuclearizing North Korea" PBS NewsHour 5/20/2021
Excerpt
SUMMARY: President Joe Biden is expected to meet Friday with South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in. The two leaders are at very different points of their terms. Biden newly-elected, and Moon in his final year. They are expected to discuss progress on North Korea, and discuss tense U.S.- China relations. Amna Nawaz gets the details from South Korean Foreign Minister Chung Eui-yong.
SUMMARY: North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong Un, has announced he will no longer abide by a moratorium on nuclear and long-range missile tests. With direct talks between North Korea and the Trump administration stalled, Kim also warned the people of his country about a “long confrontation” with the United States. The RAND Corporation’s Naoko Aoki joins Nick Schifrin to discuss.
SUMMARY: In North Korea, hunger is pervasive, and medical supplies are inadequate, in part because of U.S. and U.N. sanctions. While China and South Korea are offering humanitarian assistance, U.S. officials fear aid would be usurped by the government rather than distributed among the people who need it. But as Nick Schifrin reports, conditions in the world’s most isolated country are only worsening.
SUMMARY: Life in North Korea is difficult for outsiders to imagine. A new book attempts to pull back the curtain of opacity as it examines the country’s leader, Kim Jong Un, who took over from his dictator father when his older brother fell out of favor. Nick Schifrin talks to The Washington Post's Anna Fifield, author of “The Great Successor: The Divinely Perfect Destiny of Brilliant Comrade Kim Jong Un.”
SUMMARY: Somewhat ominous developments have occurred recently around two flashpoints of American foreign policy: Iran and North Korea. On Sunday, National Security Adviser John Bolton announced a carrier strike group was moving into the Persian Gulf because of unspecified threatening action, purportedly from Iran. Meanwhile, North Korea conducted a missile test. William Brangham talks to Nick Schifrin.
SUMMARY: Iran said it plans to cease complying with portions of the nuclear deal it signed with Western powers in 2015, though it didn't withdraw from the agreement altogether. But the announcement increases already escalating tensions with the U.S. Nick Schifrin talks to Takht Ravanchi, Iran’s ambassador to the UN, about why Iran made the decision now and whether it can trust President Trump.
SUMMARY: Iran announced its partial withdrawal from a 2015 nuclear treaty on Wednesday, citing the failure of other member nations to deliver promised economic relief after the U.S. pulled out of the deal a year ago. What does the development mean for the relationship between the U.S. and Iran, already tense? Judy Woodruff talks to Brian Hook, the State Department’s special representative for Iran.
SUMMARY: A year after the Trump administration withdrew from a 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, Iran itself warned that it will stop complying with the agreement unless it receives promised economic benefits. Judy Woodruff talks to Ambassador Wendy Sherman, who served as lead U.S. negotiator for the nuclear agreement with Iran during the Obama administration, about the impact of recent U.S. policy toward Iran.
SUMMARY: A little over a week after the second summit between President Trump and Kim Jong Un ended early and without a deal, North Korea watchers have published satellite imagery indicating that a dismantled rocket launch facility is now being reassembled. What does this development mean for U.S. strategy on denuclearization? Nick Schifrin joins Judy Woodruff to discuss.
SUMMARY: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to analyze the week in politics, including reverberations from Michael Cohen’s appearance before the House Oversight Committee and conclusions from the Trump-Kim summit in Hanoi.
Judy Woodruff (NewsHour): It has been a turbulent week in the Trump administration, from hours of damning testimony from the President's former personal lawyer, to the collapse of nuclear talks with North Korea.
To help navigate the different twists and turns, we turn to Shields and Brooks. That is syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.
Welcome to both of you. Are you ready to navigate the twists and turns?
(LAUGHTER)
(CROSSTALK)
David Brooks, New York Times: Just another week in Caligula's Rome.
(LAUGHTER)
Mark Shields, syndicated columnist: Ooh.
Judy Woodruff: Ooh.
All right, on that note, we're going to talk about Michael Cohen's testimony all day long this Wednesday, David, before the House Oversight Committee, Government Oversight Committee.
What was your main takeaway from it?
David Brooks: There were some things we learned.
We learned that Trump asked about the Moscow building project all the way through the campaign. We learned about the $35,000 check. We learned a few things.
But, to me, it was more of a moral occasion, more than anything else.
Judy Woodruff: A moral occasion?
David Brooks: A moral occasion.
What it illustrates is a President and, frankly, Michael Cohen who long ago decided that celebrity and wealth is more important than being a good person. And they have dragged us all down there with us.
And the people they have dragged most effectively are the House Republicans, a lot of them on that committee, who decided that they were completely incurious about whether Donald Trump was a good guy or a bad guy or a really awful guy, that — their own leader, they didn't seem to care about that, but they were going to rip the skin off Michael Cohen.
And so they attacked him. And what struck me is how moral corrosion happens, that you decide you're going to defend or ignore Trump, and then to do that, you have to morally distance yourself from him. And then you have to morally distance yourself from him every day.
And, eventually, you just get numb to everything. And so Jim Jordan and other people on the committee were saying, oh, we all knew this, like, it's all unremarkable. And so that's — that's how moral corrosion happens.
Judy Woodruff: How did you see the — I mean, was it — what role did the Republican questioning take, when most of them went after Michael Cohen, as David was saying, rather than talking about President Trump?
Mark Shields: They took the old attack route, Judy, which is, if you can't argue the substance, you go after the source. If you can't deal with the message, you shoot the messenger.
And that's what their whole strategy was. The very fact that not a single member of the Republican committee defended Donald Trump or what he was charged or alleged to have done, to me, was revealing. They just decided to go after Michael Cohen.
Now, it was — Michael Cohen's defects are there. They're on the record. He's going to pay for them, the legal defects in particular. But there was no payoff for him to lie. I mean, the Mueller crowd was sitting there, the Mueller, special counsel office.
They know exactly what he said. If he said anything that was false or perjured himself, he faced further problems from them. So there was a strong incentive for him not to lie.
And, to me, it reminded me of scripture's injunction that the meek will inherit the earth. If that's the case, then the congressional Republicans someday will be land barons, because they are the meekest, most docile, most submissive group of people when it comes to any judgment at all, any opinion on what Donald Trump does.
Judy Woodruff: Well, David — go ahead, David.
David Brooks: What strikes me is that they don't fear final judgment.
I don't mean that in the ultimate sense, just like…
Mark Shields: Primary judgment.
David Brooks: Primary judgment.
The idea that you can side and suborn your soul to someone who lies constantly, and that you won't ultimately pay for that, how does that work? Michael Cohen ultimately paid. In my suspicion, Donald Trump will ultimately pay. Most people who lie and cheat their way through life ultimately pay. Maybe some get away from it.
But why you would want to hitch your career to that kind of wagon is just a mystery to me, because that's just not the way the law of the universe works.
Judy Woodruff: But, of course, the Republican argument, Mark, is that Michael Cohen is a flawed character, that he's lied before, he's lied a lot. Why should we believe him now?
Mark Shields: Well, I mean, I just come back to the — there was no incentive and there was a strong disincentive for him to lie on — in his appearance under oath on television before the world.
So, I mean, everybody in the world could hear what he was saying. And it could be stacked up to what he had — he had previously said and sworn to. So, no. And he acknowledged the fact.
I mean, you spend 10 years with Donald Trump, and it's going to come at a moral cost. I'm sorry. I mean, that is the lesson we have learned. The one person in this entire administration that has gotten away with a reputation enhanced seems to be Nikki Haley. Everybody else who's near him [Trump] is somehow tarnished, diminished, hurt, wounded by that association.
It is absolutely remarkable. I think…
(CROSSTALK)
David Brooks: Dan Coats. You can think of a few.
(CROSSTALK)
Mark Shields: Yes, Dan Coats. Yes, Dan Coats. You're Right.
David Brooks: He's the Director of National Intelligence.
Judy Woodruff: Yes.
David Brooks: The thing that got me about Cohen is, how many times did you become a thug to small businessmen to stiff them for dealing with the Trump administration?
Mark Shields: Yes.
David Brooks: Five hundred times.
Mark Shields: Yes.
David Brooks: And so that's — I don't know if it's illegal or what.
But it's unbecoming in the extreme. And so I don't treat Michael Cohen as sort of the repented Chuck Colson. I mean, he — I think he didn't have any the air of someone who's really repented or really faced the spiritual music. He's just decided one side is against his interest, which is Donald Trump, and now the other side is for his interest, so he will say things that are nice for his interests.
I don't think he lied. I think what he told was basically the truth, but he was basically catering now to the left and some sort of GoFundMe campaign that will help pay his legal bills.
Judy Woodruff: But does this advance…
(CROSSTALK)
Mark Shields: I don't know. I don't have that kind of moral X-Ray.
(LAUGHTER)
Mark Shields: I mean, I don't know if he was a sinner and became a saint.
I will say this. The story of 500 people did you threaten or entities, did you threaten on Donald Trump's behalf, it was a good question asked by Congresswoman Speier from California. And it was a — and he said 500 — 50, 100, 200, 500. Let's say 500.
And — but the thing about it is, when he stiffed those small business — the plumbers and the electricians who did the work in the Trump projects, and he came back, and Donald Trump loved to hear about it, I mean, reveled in it.
Now, I mean, at what point do you say that there's no honor here? I mean, there's nothing to admire.
Judy Woodruff: And he made a point of telling that — of sharing that…
(CROSSTALK)
Mark Shields: He did. He was not — he did not set out to flatter…
(CROSSTALK)
Judy Woodruff: But quickly, to both of you, does this advance the case against Donald Trump, advance the case of impeachment, David?
David Brooks: I think a little.
We know the Trump Tower stuff in Moscow, the hush money. I tend to think there's much more — and, actually, everybody agrees, and I agree too, that AOC, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, did a very good job of laying down specific questions for specific predicates.
And she focused quite a lot on the business side of the Trump empire. And if I'm a Republican, I'm thinking there's a lot of bad news to come from there, and just whether it's taxes for all — whether it's other things.
And that's what the Southern District of New York is looking into. And so I think I'm less concerned that — there seems to be less to the Russia collusion and a lot more to everything else.
Mark Shields: I agree.
I mean, he advanced the collusion case not at all, but he certainly laid out — I mean, he gave them leads, suggestions, people to talk to, to interview, and I would say enough stuff to keep several committees going.
I did want to give a shout-out to Elijah Cummings, the chairman of the committee.
Judy Woodruff: The chair.
Mark Shields: I thought he did a good job.
I mean, I thought there was an earnestness and a directness about him. And I thought his summation is worth repeating and thinking about for all Americans, that this is important and we have got to return to normal. This is not normal.
SUMMARY: A new joint agreement signed by leaders of North and South Korea marked their most significant progress toward peace to date. Kim Jong Un and Moon Jae-in pledged a "new era," with Kim agreeing to dismantle his main missile testing site, as well as his main nuclear weapons complex -- with conditions. Yamiche Alcindor talks with Bruce Klingner of the Heritage Foundation and Jenny Town of 38 North.
SUMMARY: National Security Adviser John Bolton on Monday criticized North Korea’s denuclearization efforts, saying leader Kim Jong Un was not living up to the commitment he made to President Donald Trump at their June meeting in Singapore.
“What was significant about Singapore was the North Korean commitment to denuclearize, and they have not taken effective steps to do that,” Bolton said in an interview with PBS NewsHour correspondent Nick Schifrin. Closing the Punggye-ri nuclear test site with no international observers present, as North Korea did in May shortly before the summit, does not qualify, he said.
After the summit in Singapore, critics argued Trump failed to reach a substantive deal with Kim on winding down North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. The President and senior administration officials have claimed the meeting was a success.
Bolton said the Trump administration was working to send Secretary of State Mike Pompeo back to Pyongyang to meet with Kim again. Pompeo was in Singapore for the summit and has led the United States’ negotiating effort.
“We’re not looking for rhetoric here. We’re looking for performance of North Korea’s own commitment made to us, made to South Korea beforehand, to denuclearize,” Bolton said.
SUMMARY: Two months, two summits, two mysteries: What did President Trump promise in his meetings with Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un? Secretary of State Mike Pompeo faced the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to defend the administration and reassure lawmakers, while both Republicans and Democrats repeatedly expressed concerns. Nick Schifrin reports.
SUMMARY: Did Secretary of State Mike Pompeo successfully address the Senate’s concerns about President Trump's approach to dealing with Russia and North Korea? Sen. James Risch (R-Idaho) tells Nick Schifrin that Pompeo did an excellent job putting those worries to rest, making an excellent case for the ways the administration has been tough on Russia.
SUMMARY: Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told senators that the Trump administration has been tougher on Russia than its predecessor, and that the President has the prerogative to have private conversations with his Cabinet and with other leaders. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore) tells Nick Schifrin that Trump has actually been very slow to act, and has had to be “dragged, screaming” into taking any firm stand.
SUMMARY: Recent reports are casting doubt on North Korea's intentions. Analysis of satellite photos of the country's facilities have led some to infer that the North is continuing to improve its capabilities. In addition, the U.S. intelligence community has reportedly concluded that they have no intention of giving up their nuclear weapons. John Yang talks with former State Department official Joel Wit
[38 North].
SUMMARY: South Korean Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Lim Sung-nam sits down with Judy Woodruff to discuss what he sees as the foundations of North Korea’s possible denuclearization and next steps in the process.
SUMMARY: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week’s news, including President Trump’s summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, the conclusions of a watchdog report into the FBI’s handling of the Hillary Clinton email probe, the politics of the Trump administration separating families at the U.S. border, and more.
Judy Woodruff (NewsHour): And now to the analysis of Shields and Brooks. That’s syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.
Welcome to both of you.
Let’s start with what happened this week on the other side of the Pacific Ocean.
David, the President met, historic meeting, Kim Jong Un, the leader of North Korea. The President comes away saying there’s no more nuclear threat, he’s got very good personal chemistry, personal relationship with Mr. Kim.
What’s your take?
David Brooks, New York Times: I read a joke this week that the lion can lie down with the lamb, but you got to get a new lamb each day.
So, I give him more credit than a lot other people that I’m reading. We were — and people who really knew the North Korean situation were terrified six, eight, 10 months ago that we were really heading in a bad direction and things — there was some danger of things spinning out of control.
And now that doesn’t seem to be the case. Now, there’s — tensions have settled. There seems to be no risk of any confrontation or war. And so, to me, that’s the big story, and that’s the lead and that’s a good thing.
Now, once you get down to the second and third paragraph, it begins to deteriorate quickly. And the things Trump said about the regime, calling a murderous dictator a tough guy, that’s horrific.
The way human rights are treated, the way he just flippantly tossed off the practice, the war games, is horrific. But, to me, those are serious deficits. He did a good thing in the worst possible way.
Judy Woodruff: What’s your take, Mark?
Mark Shields, syndicated columnist: Well, Judy, quite frankly, a few months ago, you had two major powers flexing their nuclear biceps and issuing threats, serious threats, to each other, and we thought we were on the edge of war.
We’re not today. That’s good. I have no idea what’s in it — I don’t know anybody else who does — in the agreement. The President has assured us there’s no longer…
Judy Woodruff: Well, there’s not an agreement yet.
Mark Shields: There’s not an agreement, but in the documents.
But to treat North Korea as this — this is a regime that stands alone in the world, for hundreds of thousands of people being exterminated, that has consistently, as a matter of policy, used rape and forcible abortions and starvation on its own people. Hundreds of thousands of people have been exterminated.
And for the President to blithely — I’m not, you know, insisting that human rights be the centerpiece, but it has been important in every American element of foreign policy over the last generations. I mean, from Jimmy Carter to Ronald Reagan, it’s been central.
And human rights — the United States didn’t invent human rights, but, as Carter said, human rights, to a great degree, did invent America. And the President is blithely indifferent to that…
(CROSSTALK)
David Brooks: It’s also as a foil to what happened in Europe or in Quebec with the G7 the week before.
And you see him with two different sorts of relationships. With somebody like Putin or with somebody like Kim Jong Un, it’s like dictator to dictator. It’s like, we understand how to deal with power relationships. He feels comfortable in that kind of thing.
When he’s dealing with Trudeau or Merkel, it should be friends, and it should be a relationship on affection and mutual trust and reciprocity. And he’s a little uncomfortable in those circumstances.
Judy Woodruff: How do you explain that?
David Brooks: Well, I think, through his business life, he’s not had a series of relationships based on friendship, trust, and reciprocity, and affection.
He’s had relationships based strictly on self-interest and the urge to dominate. And he just feels comfortable in one kind of relationship. And, frankly, that’s even true within his White House. He has relationships based on who’s useful to who, not we are a band of brothers in this together.
Judy Woodruff: But, at this point, Mark, your point is that at least we’re not — we don’t think we’re on the verge of war.
Mark Shields: No, we aren’t. And I think that’s good. I think that’s a positive.
Churchill said it far better and shorter, that jaw, jaw, jaw is better than war, war, war. And I think that’s true.
SUMMARY: President Trump has repeated that the nuclear weapons issue is now more important than 70 years of human rights atrocities committed by the Kim dynasty in North Korea. Two defectors with harrowing stories of starvation, deprivation, public executions, losing parents, and finally their escapes, speak with Nick Schifrin about what the hope for Trump’s North Korea diplomacy.
SUMMARY: Trump and North Korea's Kim Jong Un met for the first time at a resort off Singapore's coast, the first time a U.S. President has been face-to-face with a leader of North Korea. Nick Schifrin joins Judy Woodruff from on the ground in Singapore.
SUMMARY: In Singapore, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo offered optimism that a Tuesday summit between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un would set conditions "for future, productive talks." Nick Schifrin joins Judy Woodruff from on the ground in Singapore to offer a preview of the meeting and what’s at stake.
SUMMARY: The road to Tuesday's summit between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore has been long and dangerous, littered with fraught diplomacy, broken agreements, and threats of war. Nick Schifrin looks back at how we got here.
SUMMARY: President Trump and Kim Jong Un held a whirlwind summit in Singapore and set lofty goals, but provided few details on how to achieve them. From Singapore, Nick Schifrin joins Judy Woodruff to outline the agreement and discuss whether each side got what they wanted.
SUMMARY: President Trump deserves credit for turning relations with North Korea around, says Sen. James Risch (R-Idaho) but more work needs to be done and more nuance is needed on the issue of the future of military exercises with South Korea. Risch joins Judy Woodruff to discuss first steps in North Korea diplomacy, the issue of human rights, plus Trump pulling the U.S. out of the G-7 joint communique.
SUMMARY: Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md) says that he's pleased that President Trump used diplomacy to meet face-to-face with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, but now it's necessary to see North Korea implement changes to show it's serious about eliminating its nuclear weapons program. Cardin joins Judy Woodruff to discuss the issue of human rights and Trump’s controversial treatment of allies at the G-7.
SUMMARY: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and Ramesh Ponnuru of The National Review join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week’s news, including tensions between the U.S. and allies at the G7 summit, as well as President Trump’s comments that Russia should be welcomed back, the upcoming North Korea summit between Trump and Kim Jong Un, and takeaways from the biggest primary night of the year.
Judy Woodruff (NewsHour): Now, from the words of a former President to news of the current President abroad.
We get the analysis of Shields and Ponnuru. That’s syndicated columnist Mark Shields and Ramesh Ponnuru of “The National Review.” David Brooks is away.
And it’s great to see both of you. Thank you for being here.
I want to ask you about something we just heard from James Patterson, the writer.
And that is, Mark, he was talking about we need to take the people we elect to office seriously. There is so much criticism of them. They have been run down by all the — just the flood of criticism that they get. He said, when you go to the polls to vote, remember, they’re not silly, they’re not villains.
What do you make of that?
Mark Shields, syndicated columnist: Well, they have been run down in large part by people who have replaced them. That’s been a recurring theme, particularly among conservative insurgents, but not exclusively, running against Washington, running against politicians.
I think Mr. Patterson’s exposure to President Clinton is probably, in part — I mean, Bill Clinton, let it be noted, came to office at the time with the steepest budget deficits in the history of the country, and courageously raised taxes on the richest 1.4 percent of Americans, and produced an economy that produced 22 million new jobs, after we had the lowest economic growth in 50 years when he came in.
So, and then he left at 65 percent approval. And today he’s way below that. So there’s a certain lack of appreciation, you could say, of certainly…
Judy Woodruff: For Bill Clinton.
Mark Shields: For Bill Clinton. And I think that may be reflected in Mr. Patterson’s exposure to him. And it’s certainly expressed in the President’s own behavior and speeches.
Judy Woodruff: Ramesh, is it possible to get people to think differently about politicians?
Ramesh Ponnuru, The National Review: I think it is going to be tricky.
I think what James Patterson was getting at was the distinction between the job or institution of the Presidency, and our fixation on the personality and the pageantry of the Presidency.
The Presidency has gotten more and more powerful in American government, and we depend much more than we used to on the professionalism and competence of the President fulfilling the job.
But, at the same time, the cultural footprint’s gotten bigger, too, and that has made us more interested in all of the drama of the Presidency. That’s what Presidents are rewarded these days for playing to.
SUMMARY: Americans should “be rooting” for President Donald Trump at next week’s U.S.-North Korea summit on denuclearization, former President Bill Clinton said Thursday.
“I think we should be rooting for [Trump] to succeed with the North Korea negotiations,” Clinton said in an interview with PBS NewsHour managing editor and anchor Judy Woodruff.
SUMMARY: The pace of diplomacy with North Korea picked up over the weekend in an effort to revive the summit between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. What goes into the preparation for such a moment and can the meeting be resurrected in time? Nick Schifrin talks with Patrick McEachern of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.
SUMMARY: America's top diplomat and North Korea's top envoy began Thursday with a historic handshake. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said their talks were positive but sometimes difficult and that their teams made quick headway in setting the right conditions for a summit between President Trump and Kim Jong Un. Nick Schifrin and Yamiche Alcindor talk with Judy Woodruff.
SUMMARY: A sitting U.S. President and senior North Korean envoy in the Oval Office? That's a scene that hasn't happened in almost 20 years. President Trump relaunched the summit he canceled only a week ago, signaling a shift in the administration's willingness to make denuclearization a staged process. Nick Schifrin reports.
SUMMARY: Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks join Judy Woodruff to discuss the week’s news, including President Trump calling off his summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, the outcome of Tuesday’s primaries for Democrats, and the effects of the President stirring controversy with claims of FBI spying on his campaign.
Judy Woodruff (NewsHour): Now back to the political news of this week with the analysis of Shields and Brooks. That’s syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.
Welcome to you both.
So, let’s talk first about this on-again/off-again summit with the North Korean leader.
David, it came about very quickly. It seemed to spring out of the President’s mind on his own. We didn’t — a lot of people were skeptical it was ever going to happen. It’s off again, but the President said today, maybe it’s not off.
What do you make of his diplomacy?
David Brooks, New York Times: When I went to buy my first car, somebody gave me advice. You have got to walk out. Walk out.
(CROSSTALK)
(LAUGHTER)
David Brooks: Walk out.
And I never — I’m not that kind of guy, so I didn’t walk out. But Donald Trump sort of walked out. And so he does everything in public. And he exerts pressure, he flatters, he threatens war. He does everything in public.
And so I sort of sympathize with the idea to see if there can be some breakthrough with North Korea. And I don’t blame him for going in and going out, trying to exert whatever pressure he can.
The problem is, it’s not real diplomacy. In real diplomacy, you have your sherpas, your lower-level people sort of build up some sense of agreements. You gather your allies. You don’t burn them with trade deals, the Chinese just South Koreans. You gather — and you exert real pressure.
But Donald Trump is a lone wolf, and so he’s doing it all on his own, basically, without allies, without too much help from the U.S. government, and it’s all by tweet and publicity.
And so I’m skeptical that you can get a real breakthrough without a full, stacked diplomatic and military effort, but — or at least sort of threats and pressure. But I don’t totally blame him for trying. Or, frankly, I don’t blame him for going in and out.
Anything that can dislodge something that’s stuck.
Judy Woodruff: How do you size this up?
Mark Shields, syndicated columnist: Well, Judy, it’s been 65 years since President Eisenhower on his promise to go to Korea negotiated a truce between North Korea and South Korea.
Since then, we have had 10 Presidents of both parties, five Democrats, five Republicans. With varying degrees of commitment and intensity, they have all tried to deal with resolving Korea. They have spent time. They have used learned professionals, wise academics, businessmen who know, and business persons who know the area.
And even after that, there are no major breakthroughs that’s happened. And Donald Trump, with no preparation, no knowledge, no background — I agree with David. I cheered the hope — and it was only a hope — that we might have a breakthrough.
But the idea that this was going to happen, and that somehow Kim Jong-un, who has gotten now global respect because he’s got nuclear arms, was just going to say, well, that’s it, thank you so much, you know, I think, was unrealistic.
Now, the fact that Secretary Mattis says that there’s a possibility that the summit will occur, that gives me pause. I mean, I give a lot more credence to what Secretary Mattis says than I do to the White House.
Judy Woodruff: The President clearly — or seems, David, to believe that unpredictability can pay off sometimes.
David Brooks: Well, sometimes, it can.
If we got a crazy person who is President, you may as well take advantage. But, as I say, why should they give up nuclear weapons? They have seen the Libya example and they saw what happened to Gadhafi.
The only — but at some point in history, and I don’t know if it will be in our lifetimes, they will say, we would rather have a middle-class lifestyle. We would rather have what they have in South Korea. I think, eventually, somebody is going to make that call. I don’t know if it will be this guy, or his son, or grandson, or whatever.
But, eventually, that’s going to happen. So, as long as we can keep knocking on the door, that seems fine. And as long as we don’t disrupt our allies in the area, which we seem to have terrified the South Koreans…
Mark Shields: And the Japanese.
David Brooks: And the Japanese — then the door should always be open, the pressure should always be on.
But sometimes you don’t just have any good solutions. And that’s why we have had 10 Presidents without much progress.
Mark Shields: Yes, that’s it.
This isn’t the city council in Atlantic City or the zoning commission, where you’re trying to get a deal for the casino and better parking or a large parking lot or to invoke eminent domain on your behalf.
This is really — really — significance. And it’s the difference between braggadocio and style and flash and substance. And if you look at everybody — I mean, John Kennedy, who was far more a student of foreign affairs than Donald Trump, at his first encounter with Khrushchev came away humbled, came away — and, in retrospect, contributed, historians and I think many in the Kennedy administration agree, to the emboldened Soviet Union in both Berlin and in Cuba.
So these don’t come without some cost and without some price and especially, as David pointed out, the rupture with our allies.
