North Korea will spark a new crisis in January, responding to the Trump administration’s absent appeasement.
The latest evidence for this threat came on Tuesday from North Korean state media. Pyongyang, a mid-ranking official said, sees President Trump’s interest in renewed dialogue as a “foolish trick” designed only to get Trump through the 2020 election. Chairman Kim Jong Un isn’t willing to play ball, the official warned. Instead, “What is left to be done now is the U.S. option and it is entirely up to the U.S. what Christmas gift it will select to get.”
That thinly veiled threat can be translated as: either give us sanctions concessions or get ready for a new nuclear weapon or long-range missile “gift” and/or test. North Korea is motivated by two considerations here.
First, its dissatisfaction with Trump’s unyielding position that sanctions relief go alongside significant denuclearization or disarmament action. Kim had hoped that Trump’s kind words toward him would now be matched by appeasement, that Trump would grant sanctions concessions so as to win a pretense of diplomatic progress that he could sell to 2020 voters. It hasn’t happened that way. Trump’s resolve has cost Kim badly: U.S. economic sanctions, even with Sino-Russian breaches, are causing real pain.
Pyongyang thus hopes that by threatening a new escalation, including with preparatory military activities it knows will be detected by the U.S. intelligence community, Trump will blink.
That said, North Korea’s strategy here isn’t simply motivated by the desire to extract concessions without costs. It’s also about consolidating Kim’s leadership. Recall that the North Korean leader is a relative newbie to his job. Entering power under the narrative of a youthful modernizer, Kim was always going to be judged cautiously by the hardliners. While Kim’s position as chairman has been consolidated by purges, and by reliance on hardliner gurus such as Kim Yong Chol, he remains uncertain. Kim will judge that the best way to undergird against that perception is a return to the old hardliner game of blackmail.
Ultimately, Trump cannot simply sit back and analyze these developments. He must act in anticipation of them. If Pyongyang returns to long-range missile tests, its ability to deliver nuclear warheads against the U.S. homeland will quickly become operational. Trump must thus make clear to Kim that while he favors a grand diplomatic bargain, any escalation will be met in greater kind.
