Trump, Kim and the Art of the (Non) Deal

Note:  I will be in South Korea in July attending and speaking at two conferences.  One is on the 70th anniversary of the South Korean Constitution and it is sponsored by the National Assembly.  The other conference is sponsored by the South Korean Election Commission.

What are we to make of the Trump-Kim summit?  It was far less than meets the eye from  a global standpoint, although it was terrific theater for Trump and Kim.  However, the real winner was North Korea (Democratic Republic of North Korea or DPRK) while the United States got little, and US allies such as South Korea and Japan even less.

The summit was never destined to accomplish much.  Good summits require advanced planning and often there are a lot of agreements reached in advanced such that the actual summit is really a photo op that is the culmination of what had been already scripted.  Thus, summits are deals plus public.  Here one got all publicity and no deals–all show and no substance.

The summit had the potential to be a major break through and it still might to lead to something.  Having the two leaders engage in a dialogue may in itself be important, but s of now nothing.  No agreements on cultural exchanges, opening up of diplomatic offices, or anything else.  Compared to other major first meetings–Nixon and Mao in 1972–little was accomplished.

But this summit was never really about improving US-DPRK relations, it was about Kim and Trump.  For Kim, he wins domestically by showing his people he can stand equally with the president of United States.  Be a bad boy, produce a nuclear bomb, and you get what you want.  His position is strengthened domestically by this summit.  Internationally, Kim shows how a country can get what it wants if it goes nuclear and defies international law and rules.

Trump gets his ego stroked.  Domestically he gets to claim his threats drove Kim to the bargaining table.  He gets to argue for the 2018 elections that his way works and playing the bad boy and ignoring the G7, allies, or multilaterialism works.  Trump also gets lots of media coverage.

The meeting between the two leaders alone was historic and significant.  What the new relations between the two countries  mean is yet to be determined.  If the new relationship is bilateral then it is fragile at best. By that, if the security agreements only address US-DPRK needs and fail to address concerns of Japan, South Korea, China, and the Russian Federation, I am not sure what will result.  By that, the US seems to have agreed with DPRK to halt military games with South Korea.  This may make DPRK feel more secure but it is not clear how it addresses security needs for South Korea or even Japan, and it is not clear the US really got anything out of the deal.  Trump wanted a deal to say he got a deal, but if deals involve trading something of value to get something of value, the U got nothing.  Trump trades away US, South Korean and regional security needs to that he can say he got something.  But it is not clear how it addresses larger regional needs.  Moreover, this would not be the first time the DPRK has agreed to things only to cheat.  The art of this deal showed the limits or weaknesses in Trump’s negotiating skills, unless the art was something for him and not the US or the rest of the world.

Will the halt of US-South Korean joint military exercises address DPRK’s security needs?  The claim that North Korea felt insecure in part was always false, used as a prompt for its leaders to justify their regime.  During the Cold War there was no real chance the US was going to attack it, and even after it the US was never going to attack for fear of engaging China and Russia.  In addition, the DPRK came to the table both because it had nuclear capabilities and felt it had a position of strength from which to bargain, and because of economic needs.  In light of the US cancelling the nuclear agreement with Iran, it is difficult to see what kind of security assurances DPRK would want in exchange for giving up it nuclear capabilities.  In turn, if the US were to agree to remove all troops from South Korea it leaves that country with real security concerns.

Overall, the non-deal struck between Kim and Trump does less than the two leaders or the media think.

MAD to NUTS: US Nuclear Strategy, Donald Trump, and North Korea

Asking are we on the brink of war with North Korea is the question of the day.  For many the fear is that we have two leaders–Kim Jong-Un and Donald Trump–who are  hotheads, willing to engage in public threats and not private diplomacy.  They look like two drunks in a bar at 2:00 a.m., standing chest-to-chest with one another, neither really wants a fight but neither can back down, and the conditions are ripe for the confrontation to tip out of control.  Yet the conditions for why this confrontation are so unstable reside in the evolution of US nuclear strategy which has gone from MAD to NUTS, and because so many of the conditions that actually mad the Cold War stable are not present here.

The stability of US nuclear strategy during the Cold War was MAD–mutual assured destruction. In a bipolar world divided up between the USSR and the USA, part of what kept either country from using nuclear weapons and going to war was that both countries would face certain  destruction.  Neither country would be able to prevail over the other without also suffering significant damage.  Fear of mutual assured destruction prevented nuclear war.  But the stability of the Cold War also was premised on several other factors.

First, neither country seriously questioned the regime legitimacy of the other nor that it genuinely contested each other’s core spheres of influence.  Yes there were surrogate battles across the world such as the Congo or Vietnam, but both he USA and USSR generally acknowledged the security interests of one another and did not try to cross it.  The one major instance where that line was breached was the Cuban Missile Crisis, nearly resulting in a major war.

Second, in part as a result of the Cuban Missile Crisis, the USSR and USA developed communication strategies to stay in contact.  The Hot line in one famous example.  The point is that the two countries talked to one another, they had ways to try to resolve conflicts through diplomacy.  Without talking to one another, the USSR and USA would have been locked in the classic prisoners’ dilemma where acting alone there was incentive to confess (go to war) instead of remaining silent  (Maintaining peace).  While the Cold War era was scary, MAD worked and it prevented nuclear war.

Yet beginning in the 1980s and especially into the post-Cold War era US nuclear strategy went NUTS--Nuclear utilization target selection.    NUTS was about the idea that the US had the capabilities to engage in limited nuclear war.  It could do so because of the precision of our missiles, the overwhelming force the country had, or the defenses that it had to repel an enemy attack.  In addition, as a result of the demise of the USSR, the USA as the “winner” of the Cold War felt that it potentially could make limited nuclear war just another option among others in its military menu because it did not face the threats of mutually assured destruction.  In effect, the USA could win a  limited nuclear war.

What successfully prevented nuclear war during the Cold War is missing from the confrontation with North Korea.  MAD is missing.  The US will win a nuclear or any type of confrontation with North Korea, and that alone is destabilizing because it creates incentives to take a chance and escalate a shouting match into a military confrontation.  In the case of Trump, he may be convinced we win a limited nuclear battle if it escalates to that, or that because of his apparent indifference to our third parties, a battle that inflicts damages to Japan or South Korea is acceptable.  In effect, a false or genuine belief that the USA will not face assured destruction is destabilizing,  thus moving North Korea from MAD to NUTS.

In addition, it does not help that in the last few days Trump and his Secretary of Defense have threatened the legitimacy or existence of the North Korean regime.  This too is destabilizing, but it also fits into North Korea’s game plan.  That country is an oppressive totalitarian state whose legitimacy in the eyes of its people resides in constantly stirring up fears that its very existence is under threat from outside forces such as the USA.  This appeal to fear makes it possible to extract the sacrifices the regime gets from its people.  The more Trump responds to blusters with blusters, the more it both feeds into the ability of North Korea to maintain a tight gripe on its people but also  it fuels insecurities about regime existence that can escalate into conflict.

Finally, unlike during the Cold War era, there is little in terms of back door communication channels to prevent the prisoners’ dilemma miscalculation.   Many of the statements from North Korea are blusters directed more for internal than external purposes and historically have been dismissed as such.  Yet now Kim Jong-Un’s rhetoric may be backing him and Trump into corners they cannot escape.  Neither Trump not Kim may know how far to go before their words get away from them.  In an era now (as opposed to even a year or so ago) where the two nations must deal with one another as nuclear powers, it is simply not clear how past behavior controls or directs the current conflict.

Overall, Kim and Trump may be hotheads but they face a context far different from the Cold War or from what has defined North Korean-US relations for 70 years.  It is the uncertainty of this new context that is what makes this situation so dangerous.

Final note:  Take a look at this blog of mine from last year--a work of political fiction involving Trump, North Korea, and nuclear weapons.

Tinker, Tailor, President, Spy: American Politics at the End of 2014

The November 2014 elections already seem ancient history.  Yet in barely seven weeks a host of major events have transpired, raising interesting questions about Barack Obama and the future of American politics, both short and long term.  Let’s review some of them and see what they potentially mean.

The End of the Cold War...Finally?

 The Cold War is over. Long live the Cold War!  These are the sentiments best captured by two events this past week–Obama moves to normalize relations with Cuba and the president threatens action against North Korea for hacking SONY.  Both events

Cuba and North Korea are perhaps the two last iconic symbols of the Cold War.  They conjure up images of the Bay of Pigs, the Missile Crisis, and a divided peninsula and war that would never end.  The two countries were supposedly the last two communist countries standing, and they both were surrogate grounds for the conflict between the US and USSR.  But at least in the case of Cuba and  Castro, it also represented a host of other rumors and conspiracies about the assassination of JFK, the FBI, CIA, and spying.

We embargoed Cuba for 50 years with no avail. No real good came of it and in fact one could argue that the embargo and US politics toward Cuba did more to hurt America’s relations with South America than help it.  It also meant that we had little leverage with Cuba when the inevitable day came when the Castros were no long around.  Obama’s move was smart–it represented or reflected the new realities of the world.  The generation that wanted to maintain the embargo is largely dead or gone (keep that in mind Senator Rubio) and Cuba is no longer a front line for the Cold War.

North Korea is different.  It is no longer the surrogate struggle between the US and USSR.  It represents a new type of battle–cyber-terrorism.  There is an old adage that says the most countries  are militarily prepared to fight the last war. The same is true with the US.  We still think of war and terrorism as the use of bombs and bullets or of physical invasion of one country by another with troops, planes, or even drones.  Think of terrorism and we think of 9/11.  But that is old thinking according to Richard Clarke who in Cyber War points out how vulnerable the US is to cyber terrorism and also how badly prepared we are to fight it.

The US may be one of the most wired and computer connected societies in the world.  Such sophistication means there is a lot to hack–anywhere from official government defense sites to power plants, trains, planes, financial institutions, and private companies such as SONY.   Clarke argues we are hackable, that are defenses are poor, and that the US is overall ill-prepared to fight back.  The terrorism is what happened to SONY and that it what the future 9/11s will look like.

Obama has vowed action against North Korea but options are limited.  Very little of Korea is computerized so points of vulnerability are fewer.  We have little trade with that country and few think that the president is prepared to deploy old-fashioned arms against it.  For now there is a standoff.

This is the new Cold War.  But this is not the only part of it.  The new Cold War is the on-going battle against ISIS.  And the new Cold War is how the Ukraine has become a symbol for what looks like a lingering or rekindling of the old Cold War between Russia and the United States.

The Lost Soul of American Politics

The on-going stories of race and policing in America and the Senate CIA torture report together raise troubling images about America, especially when one considers the reactions to both.  They paint a partisan and racially divided picture about the use of force against citizens and non-citizens around the world.   Collectively, they also question the moral legitimacy of the US.

One of the defining characteristics of America–or at least Americans like to believe–is that we are different and that we embody a set of moral principles that distinguish us from the rest of the world.  This exceptionalism–America as the shining city on the hill-gave us moral authority over the rest of the world.  Yet police violence and torture of prisoners destroy any credence in that exceptionalism.

There is also something wrong with the law that sanctions repeated police use of excessive force. I used to teach a class on police criminal and civil liability under state and federal law, including what is called §1983 violations. It is not easy to win these claims. The law and the public favor the police. Maybe once that was appropriate, but knowing that we have scores if not hundreds of police shooting Michael Browns per year leads one to question whether the law has tipped too far in favor of the former.  Conversely, I remember once doing a WCCO radio show years ago when news of torture fist hit the news.  I explained the Geneva Accords on treatment of prisoners and then took calls.  Repeatedly military vets called in to condemn torture declaring that they learned that if we tortured they (the enemy) would do the same to us or that we would be no better than them.  No surprise that John McCain was one of the few Republicans to condemn the CIA.

My point here is that the Senate report itself was not a surprise.  We have long since known that torture does not yield good information.  Nor should we have been surprised that the torture existed.  We have known that for years.  The real surprise is how some such as Dick Cheney seem completely morally tone-deaf and, to a large extent, how Barack Obama seemed to distance himself from the report.

A New Obama Presidency?

For a president who was supposedly rendered irrelevant by the 2014 elections, Obama is perhaps finally showing that there is still life to his presidency.  Yes he blew it on the Senate torture report, and ISIS, and on Syria.  But increasingly his moves on immigration and Cuba look bold.  While too much of his first six years has been marked by timidly, there is a glimmer of hope for progressives that his final two years will not be marked by constant capitulation to the Republicans.

However, there are still nagging doubts about his presidency for many on the left.  What will he give away to protect Obamacare or make it look like he is a compromiser?  The mistake the progressive  made in 2008 was to think he was progressive.  He was compared to George Bush but not compared to many other Democrats.  Obamacare was a Republican idea he embraced.  Obama was or became  a Wall Street candidate who took more money from the too big to fails than any other candidate in history.   Obama has done more to kill off campaign finance reform and limit in politics than any candidate in history.  Yes he protested Citizens United but he has raised more money than any other presidential candidate in history.  He was the first to opt out of the presidential voluntary public financing system, and he just signed a bill dramatically raising contribution limits to political parties.  His tenure a president will be footnoted as the one where money took over politics.

Start Your Engines

The Iowa straw poll is eight months away and the Iowa caucuses are barely 12 months out.  The 2016 presidential race is upon us.  All speculation is on Clinton v Bush, but not so fast.  But are running with a sense of inevitability but both are candidates with tired old names who may no longer  represent where the parties are.  At this point it is equally probable that either or both of them get their party’s nomination, but it is equally probable they do not.  Clinton has a better chance given a weak Democratic field, but a serious challenge from the left (almost anyone for the Democrats will be from the left) could change the equation for her.  For Bush, there are many other potential rivals such as Rand Paul who excite the base more than him.  Finally, both Clinton and Bush have many liabilities that could be exploited.  Long records in office give opponents lots to attack.