Hawks resurgent

By John Burton

It has been more than a month since the collapse of the summit in Hanoi between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jung-un and there are signs that the hawks are trying to reassert their influence in Washington.

Attention has focused on John Bolton, the U.S National Security Adviser, who has consistently pursued a hardline policy on North Korea since his days in the George W. Bush administration. When Bolton was appointed Trump's top security adviser last year, there was widespread speculation that he would try to derail reconciliation moves between Washington and Pyongyang. But Trump's willingness to hold two summits with Kim suggested that Bolton had been sidelined.

Since the Hanoi summit, Bolton has become more outspoken. He has blamed North Korea for being unwilling to take the necessary steps to reach a nuclear deal. Bolton's remarks suggest a return to an "all or nothing" stance of demanding that North Korea first denuclearize before sanctions are lifted.

Bolton also has renewed calls for China to take a tougher stance on the North. "What [the Chinese] could do more of is apply more pressure on North Korea. They could apply the U.N. sanctions more tightly. They control 90 percent of North Korea's external trade, so China could have a very important role here."

Choe Son-hui, North Korea's vice foreign minister and Pyongyang's top expert on the U.S., recently cited the increasing influence of Bolton for the collapse of the Hanoi summit because he helped create an "atmosphere of hostility and mistrust" in the nuclear negotiations. She contrasted Bolton's tough attitude with the relationship between Kim and Trump, whose "chemistry is mysteriously wonderful." But there are also signs that Trump has not yet fallen completely under Bolton's spell. The latest example is his decision not to impose additional sanctions on North Korea, while expressing a willingness to continue negotiations with Kim.

"I have a very good relationship with Kim Jong-un. He's somebody that I get along with very well. We understand each other," Trump said last Friday. "They are suffering greatly in North Korea. They're having a hard time in North Korea. And I just didn't think additional sanctions at this time were necessary. It doesn't mean I don't put them on later, but I didn't think that additional sanctions at this time were necessary."

Trump's remarks appear to be a public rebuke to Bolton, who has been pushing for tighter sanctions. Bolton applauded a recent move by the U.S. Treasury Department to impose sanctions on two Chinese shipping companies that was accused by Washington of helping North Korea's "illicit shipping practices" to evade sanctions.

For the moment then, Trump appears to be willing to continue to pursue his detente policy with Pyongyang. He has sent Stephen Biegun, the U.S. special envoy on North Korea, to Beijing to explore ways that China could play a bigger role in breaking the deadlock with Pyongyang.

But questions remain whether Trump can continue to resist the influence of hardliners as the 2020 U.S. presidential elections approach, when he will become more focused on domestic issues rather than foreign policy ones. It may thus be up to President Moon Jae-in to keep the momentum going in the months ahead. During his upcoming meeting with Trump this month in Washington, Moon should press the U.S. president, for example, to deliver on his earlier promise of making some sort of peace declaration with North Korea in order to ease tensions on the Korean Peninsula and build trust.

More importantly, Moon needs to continue to play a mediator role. He needs to explain to Trump that it is unrealistic to expect Pyongyang to immediately give up its nuclear deterrent in return for sanctions relief and diplomatic recognition down the road. Meanwhile, he needs to tell Kim that the political climate in Washington precludes the immediate lifting of the most onerous sanctions.

But in the end, the outcome of current efforts to end North Korea's nuclear program will largely depend on Trump himself. The U.S. president should be applauded for taking a bold approach in trying to find a solution by negotiating directly with Kim. But he is also known for being extremely impatient and unlikely to engage incremental and give-and-take haggling. For Trump, it's often an attitude of "my way or the highway."

Until now, Trump has shown a surprisingly flexible stance on when he wants to achieve a deal with North Korea, saying that he is in "no rush" to meet a deadline. That seems to be an acknowledgement that diplomacy takes time. But Bolton is trying to play to Trump's worst natural instincts by setting artificial deadlines and repeatedly pressing him to conclude a deal within the next year. The worry is that Trump might start listening to this advice as the 2020 election day gets closer because of a perceived need to achieve a possible diplomatic victory.

John Burton (johnburtonft@yahoo.com), a former Korea correspondent for the Financial Times, is now a Washington, D.C.-based journalist and consultant.