Tag Archives: Kim Jong Un

International news

POTUS: I don’t need to prepare for summit

Donald Trump said what? That he doesn’t need to prepare for a landmark summit meeting with the leader of North Korea, Kim Jong Un?

The president says the meeting set for next week will float or sink on “attitude.”

OK, then.

Do you think Kim is flying by the seat of his pants as the historic meeting approaches? I do not believe that’s the case.

Which brings me to pose this question: Will an unprepared Trump be able to reach some sort of rapprochement with an adversary with whom we have been at war since 1950?

Politico reported today: In extensive remarks during a visit from Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Trump mused about what might come out of the Singapore summit scheduled for next week, telling reporters that he’s “totally” prepared to walk away from the negotiating table, that he’s holding out hope for normalized relations with the repressive regime, that the U.S. could strike an agreement to formally end the Korean War, and that he could see hosting Kim in America if the meeting goes well. 

Trump has indicated the meeting could only be the first of several such meetings that produce groundbreaking agreements.

Does anyone out there wonder how in the world the president figures to make any constructive steps toward those ends without cracking the books, poring through briefing papers, learning about the man with whom he will meet?

Look, we all should hope for the best. We all should want the president to succeed, for the sake of the nation and the world. No one should want to be in a constant state of tension with a nation that possesses nuclear weapons. And no one should endorse a president who continues to threaten that nation with “fire and fury the likes of which the world has never seen.”

“Attitude” well might be insufficient to produce a result that Trump wants. Oh, I do hope the president can succeed in this wholly unconventional run-up to a landmark summit.

My fear keeps me from believing fully in his ability to pull it off.

International news

Trump-Kim summit back on … for now?

Just when you thought Donald J. Trump had tossed aside a chance to make peace with a decades-long enemy, well, he announced that he now plans to take that chance after all.

The president today announced that his meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un is back on. It’s set for June 12 in Singapore.

The president made quite a show of his decision to cancel the meeting after Kim said some angry things about the United States. I thought the summit was a goner. It bummed me out.

It’s back on. Trump had a meeting today at the White House with the No. 2 man in North Korea, Kim Jong Un’s right-hand guy. He delivered a note from Kim. Trump, curiously, then admitted he didn’t read Kim’s letter before agreeing to meet with him later this month.

Eh? Huh? What?

Well, he’s going to fly to Singapore for what he now hints might be the first of a series of meetings with North Korea. The goal is to get Kim to “denuclearize,” meaning to get rid of the nukes in his arsenal. Plus, there might be an actual peace treaty on the table, given that the Korean War shooting ended in 1953 only because of a ceasefire that both sides signed; there is no peace treaty, meaning that North and South Korea — and the United States — are technically in a state of war.

Can we trust Kim Jong Un? No. We cannot. However, can we trust our own president to carry these noble goals across the finish line? Sadly, no on that one, too.

However, let us hope for the best once these two mercurial leaders shake hands and start talking to each other.

International news

Hey, is the Trump-Kim summit back on … or what?

Someone will have to pass the Pepto.

Donald J. Trump and Kim Jong Un were supposed to meet June 12 in a historic summit between the leaders of the United States and North Korea.

Then the meeting was cancelled. Trump said Kim was saying a lot of nasty things about the United States. The president would have none of it.

The meeting is off, right?

Not precisely. The United States is sending a team to Singapore to discuss planning for, um, the meeting that might occur after all.

Man, I am baffled!

Then there’s this from The Hill: Defense Secretary Jim Mattis was also coy but suggested that summit planning is progressing. “We have got some, possibly some good news on the Korea summit, where it may, if our diplomats can pull it off, may have it back on even,” Mattis told reporters. “Our president just sent out a note about that a few moments ago … That is a usual give-and-take, you know, of trying to put together big summits and stuff.”

I want the meeting to occur. It holds tremendous promise and potential for peace in a region still technically “at war.”

But I’m curious as to Donald Trump’s strategy here. On again. Maybe it’s off. Or, maybe it’s on. Back and forth. Up and down. In and out.

I need to sit down.

International news, military news

It’s ‘Secretary,’ not ‘General’ Mattis, Mr. President

I’ve made this point already, but I feel the need to restate it.

Donald J. Trump once again referred to the secretary of defense as “Gen. Mattis.” Yes, James “Mad Dog” Mattis — one of my favorite Trump Cabinet appointees — is a retired Marine Corps general. He’s got four stars on his epaulets.

But that was then. Today, the here and now, Mad Dog Mattis is a civilian, just like the president is a civilian.

Trump’s reference to “Gen. Mattis” came as he was announcing his decision to sh**can the planned June 12 summit with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un. The president, naturally, followed that reference with a statement that the U.S. military is the strongest in the world and that it is ready to act if the need arises.

Oh, brother, man!

Mr. President, we assign these Cabinet posts to civilians. It’s a time-honored tradition that civilians control the military. President Truman had to remind Army Gen. Douglas MacArthur of that fact when he relieved him of his Korean War command in the early 1950s.

I know it’s a semantics issue. It just bothers the daylights out of me that the commander in chief cannot honor the long-standing tradition of the office with a simple reference to the defense boss as “Secretary” James Mattis.

Get with the program, Mr. President.

International news

No Peace Prize for POTUS this year

Well, there goes the Nobel Peace Prize for Donald John Trump.

Some folks had been beating the Peace Prize drum for the president on the basis of a proposed summit with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. Then the North Korean despot began talking negatively about Donald Trump, the United States, South Korea … you name it.

Now the summit is a goner. It won’t happen as planned on June 12 in Singapore. Will it be revived? Who knows?

I was one who had some hope that it could produce a breakthrough in U.S.-North Korea relations. It won’t.

Perhaps the most troubling aspect of the president’s announcement that the summit had been canceled was his return to the tough-guy rhetoric that mentions the immense power of the U.S. nuclear weaponry. As CNN reported: And he renewed his boasts of America’s nuclear weapons, which he called “so massive and powerful that I pray to God they will never have to be used.” 

Then he added this in a statement from the Roosevelt Room in the White House: “Our military, which is by far the most powerful anywhere in the world — that has been greatly enhanced recently, as we all know — is ready as necessary.”

It makes me respond: Duh!

The entire world knows this already, Mr. President. Including Kim Jong Un. There was some thought expressed that Trump’s in-your-face rhetoric about the size of his nuclear arsenal brought about the prospects of the summit in the first place.

I hope we’re not headed back to Square One with Kim Jong Un.

Today, though, was a serious setback in the quest for peace on the Korean Peninsula.

International news

Did ‘Libya model’ remark endanger summit?

If the planned summit between Donald J. Trump and Kim Jong Un doesn’t occur as scheduled, perhaps the president can take the opportunity to escort John Bolton to the proverbial woodshed.

The president needs to talk sternly to the national security adviser.

Kim has suggested the meeting might not occur as planned. Trump said there’s a “substantial” chance it would be delayed.

Why? Well, Bolton popped off the other saying something about applying the “Libya model” to dealing with North Korea. What is that model, by the way? Well, the United States sought “regime change” in Libya; Libyans rioted and rebelled; they captured dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

Then they took the fallen despot somewhere — and then killed him. Dead! He’s a goner for keeps!

That’s the “Libya model” as espoused by the national security adviser? Trump, though, was quick to distance himself from that unfortunate example, which he did in Bolton’s presence while speaking to reporters in the White House.

No doubt Kim heard what Bolton said. He gets the implication that Bolton’s message conveyed. I mean, Trump did once refer to Kim as a “smart cookie,” isn’t that right?

There are other complications coming into play. Kim’s view of “denuclearization” of the Korean Peninsula well might differ from what Trump and the South Koreans want.

Thus, the summit might be in some immediate and hopefully temporary jeopardy.

Back to Bolton.

Trump has hired a serious hot head to be his national security adviser. Bolton is unafraid to recommend a war footing. Trump has entrusted this champion of regime change with the role of providing crucial national security advice to the commander in chief.

I just implore Bolton to lay off the “Libya model” rhetoric.

International news

‘Libya model’ in play … or not?

That didn’t take long.

Donald Trump brings John Bolton aboard just a few weeks ago to be national security adviser. Bolton, a noted hard-liner, then tell Fox News that the president will follow the “Libya model” in shaping U.S. policy with regard to North Korea’s nuclear program.

What does the president then do? In Bolton’s presence, he tells reporters he isn’t following the Libya model, that he’s going to craft a unique policy as it concerns efforts to persuade North Korea to dismantle its nuclear weapons.

“The Libyan model isn’t a model that we have at all, when we’re thinking of North Korea (DPRK),” Trump told reporters at the White House before meeting with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.

You see, the Libya model didn’t work out well for the late Moammar Gadhafi, the strongman who used to run Libya.

Rebels revolted there, overthrew Gadhafi, then captured him and dragged off to some location — and then killed him! He’s dead, man!

Do you think North Korea’s strongman, Kim Jong Un, wants to hear some comparison to the Libya model? I, um, do not believe so.

Trump is trying to preserve some semblance of hope that he and Kim will actually meet next month in Singapore to discuss a whole range of issues. It’s a big deal, this meeting. U.S. presidents and North Korean dictators have never met face to face.

Trump’s rhetoric about Kim has transformed from threats to “Little Rocket Man” to high praise for him as someone interested in forging an actual peace treaty with South Korea.

Then his national security adviser, Bolton, steps in it by referring to an event that ended badly for another world leader.

Let’s get our nation’s message straight, shall we?

International news

What happened to those sweet nothings?

All that sweet talk Donald J. Trump has been heaping on Kim Jong Un of late seems to have gone into one ear and out the other.

The North Korean dictator seems to be putting the planned Trump-Kim summit in some jeopardy because he’s angry over the planned joint military exercises that will take place with South Korean and American troops.

Kim thinks the military maneuvers are meant to prepare for an invasion of North Korea, or so he says. Thus, the summit might not happen if Kim decides to pull the plug on it.

What is happening here?

U.S. and South Korean troops have been practicing for years since the ceasefire ended shooting during the Korean War. We haven’t invaded the North yet. The exercises are meant to prepare the South for a possible invasion from the North; I mean, the North did invade the South in 1950, which caused the Korean War. Kim Jong Un’s grandfather started the fight.

The president of the United States was yammering about “little Rocket Man,” and bragging about the size of his “nuclear button.” He was taunting Kim to try anything at all to provoke a response that would deliver “fire and fury the likes of which the world has never seen.”

Donald Trump changed secretaries of state. The new guy at State, Mike Pompeo, went to North Korea in secret and then the nations announced the summit between Trump and Kim.

Suddenly, Kim has become a paragon of virtue in Trump’s mind. He released those three Americans he held captive. Trump hailed Kim Jong Un as a fine man, a wonderful fellow.

Now we have Kim threatening to upset everything all over again.

Don’t tell me the North Korean despot responses positively only to epithets. That cannot possibly be true, can it?

My hope is that Trump holds his fire. If he’s able.

International news

Wishing success for the country … as always

I have been grappling with conflicting emotions ever since, oh, Jan. 20, 2017 — the day Donald John Trump took office as president of the United States.

You know, without a shadow of a doubt, about my feelings of him as president. He is unfit for the office at almost every level imaginable, in my view at least. However, he was elected to the office under the rules provided by the U.S. Constitution. I don’t quibble with that. Not for a moment.

Do I wish him success? Well, yes. But only grudgingly.

The better question might be: Do I wish the nation success? Yes. Without any malice at all.

Where is the disconnect? It probably rests in Trump’s penchant for gracelessness when the moments demand grace and class.

When good economic news presents itself, the president is prone to boast out loud, taking all the credit for himself and never giving credit to anyone else, such as — oh, let me think — his predecessor for leaving the nation in much better economic health than he found it eight years earlier.

Trump stands on the cusp of achieving possibly a monumental breakthrough with an enemy of the United States. He’ll meet next month in Singapore with North Korean despot Kim Jong Un. It will be the first face-to-face meeting between U.S. and North Korean heads of state.

Do I wish, hope and pray for a positive outcome? Do I hope that Kim agrees to de-nuke the Korean Peninsula? Do I want the nations to forge a “normal diplomatic relationship”? Of course I do. I want the nation to succeed.

Trump, though, is likely — as he has demonstrated so many times in the past — to piddle all over the good feelings that should come from a successful U.S.-North Korea summit. How will he handle it? Will he boast that none of this would have been possible with anyone other than him at the helm?

I remain adamantly opposed the idea of Donald Trump serving as president of my country. That opposition is unlikely to dissipate any time soon — if ever!

However, I always want the nation to prosper, to succeed, to continue its march along its path of greatness.

Yes, even with Donald John Trump as president.

International news

Give credit where it is due

I’ll admit to being a bit slow on the uptake with this word of praise for the president of the United States.

My wife and I are in the midst of executing a relocation from one community another. I’m taking a breather at the moment. So … here goes.

Donald J. Trump managed to secure the release of three Americans held hostage by North Korean dictator/goofball Kim Jong Un. I want to give the president a good word that release on the eve of his June summit with Kim, which will occur in Singapore.

Kim Jong Un is a nasty fellow who runs a nasty regime that adheres to a nasty ideology. That the three Americans — all of Korean descent — have come out of their imprisonment in relatively good shape is nothing short of miraculous.

Trump, though, seemed to stumble on his success when he welcomed the men back home at 3 a.m. While delivering some impromptu remarks, the president seemed to heap some undeserved praise on Kim, calling his behavior “excellent.”

I’m shaking my head a bit. Mr. President, Kim Jong Un held these men against their will, leveling a bogus espionage charge against them. There is nothing “excellent” about that act. Nothing, sir!

The president deserves an “excellent” grade, though, for dispatching Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to work out the details of the summit — and for bringing the three American captives home.

As for Kim Jong Un, I feel the need to caution the president to tread very carefully in the weeks leading up to the summit. Kim cannot be trusted to do the right thing any more than some of Trump’s own critics — and that includes yours truly — can trust him to do right.

Still, well done, Mr. President, in securing the release of these three Americans.