Little at stake in Hanoi summit

By Stephen Costello

The stakes at the summit in Hanoi between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un are not very big. This is largely because the possible downsides from the meeting are negligible, and greatly overstated.

The upsides are potentially great, and are practically achievable, but National Security Adviser John Bolton, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and members of the U.S. Congress are in almost unanimous opposition to elements that would constitute a practical, win-win deal.

President Trump is virtually alone in his apparent willingness to provide significant sanctions relief in exchange for meaningful rollback of nuclear and missile programs. Therefore, success should not be hard, but it is unlikely to be the breakthrough that it could be.

The threat of a return to provocative U.S. exercises and North Korean nuclear and missile testing is exaggerated. It would also be an impractical reversal for both Pyongyang and Washington. Both have better options to pursue if they are unsatisfied with the Hanoi meeting.

Because of better ties with China and South Korea, the North can wait for Trump's exit from the scene. And because Kim and Trump have already achieved a “freeze for freeze” on destabilizing actions by the U.S. and North Korea, Washington can engage indefinitely in diplomacy while claiming to have solved much of the North Korea problem.

The overriding question surrounding Hanoi is not what North Korea will give. Instead, the question is what the U.S. will give. Signs are that Kim is ready to return to the basic deal that was working in 2000, when the U.S. recognized that economic development was central to easing the North's isolation, which was ― in turn ― key to its insecurity.

The nuclear program hinged on this. Statements and actions by Pyongyang in the past two years suggest strongly that it would be willing to verifiably cap and roll back its programs if the U.S. were to return to a similarly balanced deal.

Statements and actions by the U.S. are very different, particularly since the Singapore summit. U.S. behavior has been more in line with U.S. policy since 2001 when sanctions and coercion replaced the working Agreed Framework. Since Singapore, North Korean, South Korean and Chinese voices have joined the most experienced U.S. officials in trying to redirect U.S. policy toward the previous winning strategies, with little apparent success.

In another similarity with the U.S. destruction of the U.S.-DPRK agreement in the early 2000s, the Trump administration has violated and renounced multiple international agreements in the past two years, including the Iran JCPOA, preventing another nuclear program. Therefore, the question of U.S. compliance is a practical consideration. Bilateral agreements with bilateral exchanges are weaker; multilateral or international agreements ― like the JCPOA ― are stronger.

Potential agreements that spell out a timeline of years until full denuclearization of the North will not be “recognizing the DPRK as a nuclear state,” or “locking-in the North's nuclear weapons identity,” as some are dreading. By some measures, the North has been nuclear for 12 years already. But there is no hard evidence that it can miniaturize a weapon. It has never tested a warhead re-entry vehicle. And any use of a nuclear weapon is a suicide pill for the leadership.

In the North Korean view, the creation of a “nuclear force” may have been well worth it if the result is that the country can emerge from isolation and begin to develop in a state of increased security. Because it will be required to join a range of international agreements and institutions in order to have access to development, that leverage can insure a denuclearization timeline. In contrast, the leverage from sanctions will not only be increasingly unnecessary, but counterproductive.

U.N. sanctions will be the key. If they can be eased in parallel with major North Korea actions, this will be the breakthrough needed, allowing major economic planning to commence in North Korea. If they are kept in place while the U.S. offers unilateral gifts, and/or the easing of U.S.-only sanctions, that will signal that the U.S. will remain on the sidelines as the two Koreas forge a new relationship.

For President Moon Jae-in of South Korea, the Hanoi summit could reward 21 months of hard work. A major reduction of U.N. sanctions would play a central and positive role in allowing strategic economic planning and growth on the Korean Peninsula and in the region. If, on the other hand, the U.S. does not match significant North Korean actions, Moon would be disappointed.

But Moon will have some options. He could make the most of any smaller sanctions relief, such as a U.S. waiver for resuming operations at the Gaeseong Complex and Mount Geumgang resort. He could also launch a new diplomatic effort to get U.N. sanctions softened and a North Korean weapons rolled back.

But it would be a mistake to view North-South Korean rapprochement as a personal project by Moon. North and South Korean leaders have tried to achieve an end to the Korean War in one way or another since the late 1950s. More practical efforts continued into the 1980s and 1990s.

In political, strategic and economic ways, South Korean leaders were destined to try this, both because of the huge advantages that were possible, and because of the heavy domestic costs of continued division.

In this sense, the opposition to diplomacy by former Korean Presidents Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye, and by former U.S. Presidents George Bush and Barack Obama, signaled lack of ambition and misunderstanding of the possible benefits, rather than prudence or strategic logic.

Moon is doing what any ambitious modern Korean leader would do. As the most flexible democracy in the region, South Korea should be supported by its allies and friends.

One hopes for a breakthrough in the second Kim-Trump summit, but even a small agreement should be welcome. Regardless of the results in Hanoi this week, the Korea projects need local, consistent, democratic leadership. Seoul should be encouraged to embrace its central role.

Stephen Costello (scost55@gmail.com) managed the Kim Dae Jung Peace Foundation Washington office in the 1990s. He directed the Korea program at the Atlantic Council there from 1999 to 2004. He now directs AsiaEast.Org, a policy initiative focused on security, development and politics in Northeast Asia. He writes from Washington and Seoul.