North Korea News Podcast by NK News - What Donald Trump’s return means for North Korea and Kim Jong Un

Episode Date: November 8, 2024

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Hello, podcast listeners. I have an important announcement to share about upcoming changes to the NK News podcast. Starting November 20th, our full-length episodes with special guests will be exclusively available to NK News subscribers. This shift will allow us to invest more in bringing you top quality interviews, cutting edge analysis and a more comprehensive NK News experience across our website and podcast platforms. Don't miss out.

Subscribe now to stay fully informed and support our mission to raise the bar in North Korea reporting. Until the end of November, podcast listeners can sign up for just a dollar for their first are our daily update and week ahead newsletters, plus get exclusive invites to online webinars and occasional in-person events. Join our community today and help to the NK News podcast. I'm your host, Jack Hoes-Wetzelut, and this is a quick fire, rapid podcast recorded on Friday, the 8th of November, shortly after the US election results. So we now know that Donald Trump has won and we've got three of my favorite colleagues around the table. We

have Chad O'Carroll, Colin Zwirko, who's wearing a mask, he's not feeling the best today. So you may hear a throat scratch or a cough or a throat clear or two. And we also got Jongmin Kim. Welcome on the show. Thanks for having me. First of all, I'd like to say that I think we can celebrate the fact that Chad is clearly committed to being remaining an active North Korea watcher in the next four years. I know there was some doubt about whether Chad would stay in the scene

if Kamala Harris won and we had another Democrat in the White House for the next four years. So well done, Chad. Thanks for sticking around. Can you briefly explain yourself? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So like I'm, uh, political in the US at all. But he's not mega. No, but except for the red cap, he's not wearing today.

No, but just personally, you know, 2016 to 2020 was like a roller coaster for this office. We had trips to summits, we had visits to Pyongyang. It was really, to be a reporter on Korea, it was really interesting. And I mean, I know that- Because things seemed to change, like, after decades of stagnation.

Yeah, yeah. And I know COVID contributed to a lot of slowness after that, but being honest, the Biden administration just clearly didn't prioritize North Korea at least. And it's led to four years of nothing really. So I was personally like, you know, I think it got to the point where I thought if Harris won I would take a sabbatical of some sort and just maybe work two days a week and do

something else, learn to play golf. Maybe I don't know. Not golf. But now I don't know, not golf, but. But now you're all in again. Yeah, because I think. So no golf. I mean, for a journalist, chaos is good. New York Times, CNN, Washington Post,

they all had their best years under Trump. I think we have to be honest about it. Brutally honest, Chad. For the record, I don't root for chaos. But also, yeah, just as a business, we were financially growing massively during that period and the whole thing is sort of flatlined since Biden came in. So I think it will be interesting. And yeah, personally, I know it has a lot of risks for the US domestic situation and

so on, but I'm not a US citizen. So we, us three, Chad, Colin and me were actually the three, some of the oldest remaining NK staffers in the office who experienced the Trump years when Trump was still on Twitter. Now X, now he's on Truth Social, I believe. Maybe you should get an account. It was crazy covering Trump-Kim relations, like Trump dropping the news about, you know, getting a letter from Kim Jong-un on Twitter abruptly, not talking to his aides apparently, and knowing about the summit like just a day or two ahead when they were meeting in Panmunjom and stuff like that.

Yeah, I was talking to an academic the other day who was reflecting on the Trump years the first time around and said that Donald Trump brought the United States and North Korea closer to war and closer to peace on both extremes than any other president had. There's a little bit of hyperbole there and there's also still some argument about how close we actually got to open conflict in 2017. But there's some truth to that, right? That we really swung from the rafters there in in both directions. Anyway so let's talk about some of the implications. Let's start with you Jong-min. Has there

been, well what's been the official response from from South Korea for example has President Yoon already called up and congratulated Donald Trump? Right after Trump declared victory before before the polls even closed, Yun rushed, actually. He was, I think, I believe, one of the five world leaders who tweeted at at real Donald Trump immediately saying, oh, congratulations, Mr. President-elect. And then the following morning at 8 a.m.

Korea time, which was, I believe believe late night in wherever Trump was, Trump did a 12-minute phone call with Yoon. Wow. Very quick. I think he was maybe the first Asian president that Trump talked to, which of course South Korean media spinned into standalones. Yeah. And apparently Trump was the one that brought up the North Korea issue first to Yoon. And Yoon said, Yoon actually had a very big press conference yesterday where Chad went. And Yoon recalled that Trump seemed still very much interested in North Korea issues.

So we- Insolving it, you mean? Just in general, to know more about what's going on right now. And Yoon said Trump was asking what's going on. So I said like North Korea has been sending all these thousands of balloons and all sorts of missiles randomly. So our people are having a very difficult time and Trump allegedly according to you said oh that is unbelievable. I'm very concerned and they did not really go into nuclear issues it seems but general North Korea issues and some trilateral matters

like shipyard issues, shipbuilding issues and trade. But it seems like those were the main two things alongside Ukraine issue, of course. Right, so President Yun, they're clearly trying to get some personal rapport and trust quite quickly with Donald Trump. Speaking of which, according to Kim Tae-hyo, the deputy at the National Security Office, he said

Yoon congratulated Trump by saying, congratulations on your landslide victory under the grand slogan, Make America Great Again. Personal touch. Okay. Now, unofficial comments from South Korean officials that you maybe get in touch with? It seems like they are just really swamped right now, trying to figure out who's going to be in the Trump cabinet. But it seemed like they were pretty well prepared, I think, about this possibility in the past few weeks, proven by the signing of the cost sharing agreement just a few days before the

election. But is that a was that a good idea to do a lower rate right before Trump came in? Chad might want to weigh in. We'll come back. I want to come back to that one. I just want to get sort of do a recap of what the responses are from different countries and then get back to that particular cost sharing deal. Okay, has North Korea made any statement in its media? Not yet. Okay. Now, how about Russia? I know that Dmitry Peskov said that Putin wasn't planning to congratulate Donald Trump on the victory. I don't think I've seen anything yet. I've not been tracking Russia.

He did. Well, I just saw this morning that Putin congratulated Trump on the victory. Oh, he did? Okay. Well, not initially, but he has now. Okay. Uh, I think the, uh, the gist that I got from our colleague Anton was that, uh, for Russia, nothing changes, U S is still a hostile state and, and we'll sort of see Trump's actions first when he actually gets to the Oval Office, so kind of a wait and see. Well, Putin did say that he hoped Harris would win in jest.

Ah, wait, a Putin joke? Yeah, it looked like sarcasm. It was in an interview. Okay. Now what about China, the People's Republic of China? How have they reacted to this? Any sign? Any statements? I'm not sure. Okay. By next week, we'll know for sure. Now, in his first term, as President, Donald Trump shifted from fire and fury to historic summits with Kim Jong-un and a lot of letter writing. Do you expect him to pursue a

similar approach this time around or would we see a different strategy and what might he view as his legacy or unfinished business with North Korea? Well I do think that what we've seen from from Trump's personality is that he will want to secure his legacy and he will want to make a splash on the world stage. So I think it's quite possible that Trump will want to, you know, have a big moment going to meet Kim in Pyongyang. I think like that this is what Trump would want. Right.

And I have some thoughts about how that could work out because I was reviewing the letters that they were writing to each other even after their last meeting at the inter-Korean border in June 2019. And these letters, they were released, they're not officially confirmed, but pretty sure that they're real. And in the last one, Kim said that, I will wait for you to let me know when the joint drills finish.

So I think this is the key thing that Kim would not even engage at all. He would just expect Trump to end joint drills. He would just expect Trump to end joint drills, and then that would be the signal that he can trust to reengage with Trump. But I don't think Trump can just do that. That would cost a lot for him to do that.

And I think Trump's best chance at getting something done is a surprise trip to Pyongyang. But Kim, that's the conundrum because I don't think Kim can accept that because he would be taking a huge gamble. So Trump wants to kick things off with a personal meeting. But Kim needs to wait for some sign of trust. So that's where I'm a bit confused about where this would go. What do you think, Chad? So I think what we're likely to see is there's a possibility, I think strong likelihood we'll see Donald Trump resume the leader to leader contact pretty soon with something like low profile, like wishing Kim happy birthday on Twitter or something in January. And that could pave the way for some letters or things like that.

But I think we, there's a quite strong chance it might be limited to that kind of interaction for a while, just because if we're being honest, North Korea is probably quite low on Trump's broader laundry list of issues he has to deal with. So there's Israel-Palestine, Ukraine-Russia, although North Korea does come into that now in a quite significant way. And then immigration, throwing enemies in jail. There's a lot of stuff like he's going to be prioritizing domestically, even before foreign relations is considered. But isn't the reverse also true that for Kim Jong-un, the United States is not exactly

priority number one? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. 100%. 100%. I mean, for decades it was. For decades it was all we want to do is talk to America. And now it's not anymore. They've got things going on with Russia. They've got the soldiers overseas So there's a lot of priorities, you know, North Korean media has been mostly silent on Trump which is you could argue a good thing for the prospects of Personal relations to restore but there's been maybe Colin you can elaborate There's been statements that have kind of I think it was in summer elaborate

statements that have kind of, I think it was in summer, elaborate, articulated that while we appreciated Trump's personal friendship with our leader, that's separate from state to state relations. And we are on a very different track right now. Yeah, I think that that was a good sign of the keeping the door open to, to see what Trump is capable of in the future, what he can pull off. Because I think you wrote in your piece yesterday that Trump is a wild card, they still see him as a wild card,

that he can bring something to the table, and Kim thinks, well, there's a possibility there, at least, that we wouldn't see with the Democratic leader. So, but again, I think it all is very simple to boil down North Korea's perspective right now, which is they have the freedom in the room to improve their deterrent, their nuclear deterrent. And they have no reason to stop that. So it will take a huge sign and a huge concession from the US to even get them to the table. And Kim again said in his final, in his final letter, according to the letters that we have that they can wait around. It doesn't matter to them.

They, uh, they don't need the U S but they will sure see some benefits in it. If Trump can stop drills and then, yeah, but Trump was still talking about beach resorts and all kinds of stuff. So Trump is, is very focused on himself, himself, making a big splash, getting all the attention and then doing some, you know, he could like, I think Trump would agree to something like opening up a one San Calma resort or something to tourists. And that would be enough for him. You know, I'll float a, an interesting idea that just came to me, was that given the problem with state to state relations,

but possibly the continuing personal good relations, we might see something a little bit unorthodox, like Trump and Kim meeting unofficially on the sidelines of some multilateral in Moscow, for example, where Putin broke as a bro coming together or something. Yeah, I think that's a good idea, because that's the thing about the political capital

that Trump would spend on going to Pyongyang. He could get away with it so easier just on the sidelines and then boom, it's a surprise and boom, they get things started. North Korea, if you're listening, we would love to go to that and cover it in Russia. Thank you. Yes, now-

Russia, if you're listening. Russia, if you're listening. Russia, if you're listening as well. Chad, sanctions. Trump previously focused on sanctions and economic leverage and promises to North Korea. Given North Korea's adaptation to sanctions and its resilient economy, do you think that sanctions will continue

to be a viable tool or could Trump explore alternative forms of leverage? Yeah, so I was thinking about this yesterday. Like we have this what two months, just under two months until the 74 days or something. Yeah. On the one hand, Kim Jong-un could use that to just get as much done as possible in terms of ICBM nuclear testing and

Ooh, the final, finally the seventh nuclear test much vaunted. Bay based on the logic that this is Biden's presidency at the same time, I think the optics would would be a bit awkward because Trump has now won and Trump has telegraphed throughout the election his, his capability of sort of reigning in Kim Jong Un's wild and military ambitions so that it would and it would it could bring them to a bad start in the way that we saw in January 2017 But I don't think Trump sees these things as threatening anymore

I think he was influenced by the people around him at the beginning of his first term But by the end of it things like missile tests He's not out there saying that these are threats. So and is he ideologically opposed to countries going nuclear? saying that these are threats. So and is he ideologically opposed to countries going nuclear? Uh, well, he's very anti. If you listen to him on long, long form interview, he's, he's claims to be very anti-nuclear. He, he thinks it's a much bigger threat to the humanity than global warming in the short term. But, uh, he also emphasized in a

podcast I heard recently that he had to modernize and invest in the US nuclear capabilities. And he also says that stuff like it's great to be on good terms with dictators with nukes. Right. So, okay, like with many things with Donald Trump there, you could point to both possibilities. Just going back to your sanctions question and the economic leverage, we shouldn't forget that during his presidency, he got really quite, I think angry with the Treasury Department

for preparing to or designating new, and I remember he tweeted something about that he was unhappy with Treasury for doing new designations in the middle of the diplomacy. Because it kind of went against what he was trying to do. So that's another thing about timing is, practically speaking, you have to look at how much time is it going to take for him to get the people into the departments that he needs this time?

Does he have a good plan this time? Do the people around him have a plan to put loyalists in place? Can they actually do that logistically? Those might cause things to be delayed. Okay, now we've got to keep moving forward. Trump has expressed in the past an interest in striking big deals in foreign policy. Do you think he's going to consider a grand bargain with North Korea this time, such as a peace treaty, sanctions relief, and in return for perhaps partial denuclearization?

What compromises might he be willing to make if he is looking for a big deal? Like a variable of the Hanoi deal maybe? Giving up more and giving Kim Jong-un more. Well first do we know how much to attribute the failure to Trump himself or Bolton or Bolton? Like how, you know, uh, where does, where is he in his head? Trump is he, does he just like, does he regret kind of, I mean, I know that he's criticized Bolton. Does he just regret like listening to people and now he's going to say, like, do we know what he really thinks about this? Well, on the, the, this three hour podcast, he did with Joe Rogan. He was asked about the people that he put in place at the start. And he said, look, I'm not a politician on my first day.

They said, sir, you have a thousand appointments to make. And he just had no idea where to start. And he, he did. What do you only ever made half of them? He did four years. He made half of those appointments. Yeah, true. And then, and then, uh, he, he really, in that podcast, it like, it blew my

mind how much he hates Bolton. Like he was really throwing him under the bus, just saying he ruined a lot of things. And, um, I feel like Trump doesn't have, uh, a really strong, like if you say, well, he's anti-nuclear or whatever, I don't think he has a really strong ideology. I think he's mostly invested in himself. And I think he, you know, himself and I think he you know he doesn't want a war to start. He wants South Korea to you know not feel like

they have to start a war to whatever but he'll accept them as a nuclear state in exchange for some kind of surface-level freeze. I feel like that's well within his you know because that will be his win. He wants a win. Right. And when I was talking to Professor Choi Jong-gun, who was the South Korean counterpart at the time, he was in charge of the military agreement at the time. And he recall it being in the same room with Bolton and Trump, he could see that Trump wanted to run the whole thing without listening to anybody, especially Bolton, because in the off-record meetings, he would just bash on Bolton in front of the North Koreans

and embarrass him. That is, that's awkward. We should say, you've had Beegin on the podcast before the former special envoy on North Korea, and I remember that others who were part of that Hanoi process, I mean, I think some of us thought it was the Bolton effect that led to that falling apart, but the people I've spoke to that were in the process said it was bigger than that. And it was just down to the fact that if the deal had been done in the way North Korea wanted,

it would have effectively been a tacit recognition of North Korea having a long term nuclear capability. But four years later, I think there are more practical assessments that that is probably the way things have to go. The key question is who the officials on Korea are going to be. Yeah, and of course, we don't know that yet. We're a long way from knowing that. Now what about, okay, you mentioned this earlier, Chad, South Korea's attempt to Trump-proof its alliance with the United States at the 11th hour by signing the special measures agreement,

how likely is that to backfire on them? Well, there's a source in the South Korean government that told me they were very uncomfortable about this negotiation going back months because if Trump wins and sees that the US and South Korea accelerated negotiations to effectively get around Trump and sign a deal that was meant to be done in 2025. And a rate that's lower.

Is this for our listeners there? What is it, 1.3 billion US dollars instead of the 10 billion that Trump says he wants? Yeah. So the source told me, look at it this way, if Kamala Harris or Biden won, we could just negotiate peacefully and it would be a pretty modest bump. If we do it ahead of time, when Trump comes in, if he wins, he's going to look like he's been cheated and that this Yun guy is a slippery negotiator and is just trying to get around things. We'll see how it plays out. I agree with what the source said. I don't really understand.

It seems like a lot of risk and not, given how important personal relations are, as we've seen in the Trump presidency before with other world leaders like Shinzo Abe, like you don't want to get off on the wrong foot. Yeah. No, for our listeners who may have lost the thread a little bit, we're talking about the cost sharing of stationing US troops here on the Korean peninsula. And that deal has been signed for 2026. But that was signed right before the call, right? Well, I guess, you know, Trump wouldn't have time for the election and you know, Trump wouldn't have had time to learn all those

details and to learn that maybe you is being slippery or whatever. But, but, but he has said, I think Trump in one of the interviews recently, he put out a number. I'm going to make South Korea pay $10 billion because they're basically minting it. They're a minting it. They're a money-making factory.

We'll get $10 billion out of them, no problems. And now we're at 1.3. So that is a heck of a gap. And I think all somebody has to do on the Trump team is say, let's look at these numbers and just put a letter in front of him with a table showing here's what you want and here's what we're getting. And that may be enough to make him upset. Yes, Jong-Win.

Just one thing is the the rush negotiation also might have had something to do with domestic politics in South Korea because the defense cost sharing thing, it's usually a big headline in South Korea that gets people pissed off really if it's too high. Oh, we've just gone into the adult chamber. Oh, sorry. Okay.

And for this one, it's usually the first year and the rest of the years, the rate is different. Ah. Sorry. And for this one, it's usually the first year and the rest of the years, the rate is different. So I think, Yun has like two years left. Right, right. So they don't really care all that much about what happens after the two years. Right, but it is of course possible,

even though a deal's been signed, Trump could simply say, I'd like to renegotiate, like he did with the FTA, which was already in place. And last time it stalled, and it went over to the Biden administration, which was already in place. And last time it stalled and it went over to the Biden administration, which was probably in Yoon's mind, because if it stalls and goes over to the 2027 government, well, that's something they have to deal with. A reminder that starting from November 20th, our full length episodes with

special guests will be exclusively available to NK News subscribers. This shift will allow us to invest more in bringing you top quality interviews, cutting-edge analysis and a more comprehensive NK News experience across our website and podcast platforms. So don't miss out. Subscribe now to stay fully informed and support our mission to raise the bar in North Korea reporting. Until the end of November, podcast listeners can sign up for just a dollar for their first month with the following 12 months at 50% off. Head to nknews.org slash join for more. You'll get full access to the NK News website, news, analysis and opinion every day, our

daily update and week ahead newsletters, plus get exclusive invites to online webinars and occasional in-person events where you might even meet me. Join our community today and help support the podcast grow. Now, what about the prospect of South Korea going nuclear? We talked earlier about whether Trump is ideologically opposed to going nuclear. We talked earlier about whether Trump is ideologically opposed to go nuclear. There are some voices here in South Korea that talk about South Korea either stationing US nuclear weapons here or getting their own. What would Trump say about that? Have you heard anything in the podcast, Chad, in the Joe Rogan show? Sorry about which part? About whether Trump would accept South Korea

having its own nuclear weapons. Oh no, they didn't touch on that He he himself did not really go into the South Korean nuclear armament issue, but Elbridge Colby did right okay? He may just explain for a listen who Elbridge He is allegedly a very close a to Trump who could potentially have some sort of post in the Pentagon Maybe mmm now Elbridge Colby has said repeatedly that China should be the focus of US foreign policy in Asia and that, you know, Korea should basically, like every other US ally, quote unquote, take care of its own military and defense needs first. But I wonder whether given China's role, is there or rather China's outsized position in Trump's foreign policy? Do you see that

potential for South Korea to leverage any sense of urgency that Trump or his close aides like Albert Scoby have around China to get more of what South Korea wants like lower cost sharing or nuclear weapons? It's possible, but I think there's also a risk a lot of what we're talking about could go south from the perspective of, you know, Trump's talked a lot about tariffs, right? And throwing major, major tariffs on China. And if he does that, I think Beijing could be more inclined to say, to start thinking like, we really do need to work closer with North Korea, with Russia, and create this kind of alternate sort of structure.

And if that starts happening, the impact on South Korea, I mean, South Korea is going to be really pushed around in the middle of all of that. They'll also get directly hit by, doesn't Trump also target, he says like South Korean cars are, you know, should be treated the same way they Yeah, tariffs on on South Korean products So then once let's say the economic issue is more priority for Trump and probably will be and so the first things that come Out are a start of a conflict between South Korea and the US economically And then there's even more reason for the conservatives in South Korea to push for nuclear weapons because they say we see where this is Going and then you know yeah yeah it's already started yet just yesterday three very high

profile South Korean conservatives either wrote or spoke at the national assembly about how now that Trump won really congratulations they say but we are you know pickle here because he won't have that much assurance for us to defend Seoul over LA or whatnot. So they were like, we have to go for at least nuclear latency. In a pickle or a kimchi, I ask that. With reports of ongoing economic hardship and possibly even not starvation, but the next level before that, how might Kim Jong-un respond to renewed

US engagement or pressure? Could we see internal challenges that influence Kim's approach to diplomacy with the US? Well, you know, it's funny looking back at what happened in the latter years of the Trump administration, I think a lot of people always, you know, four years on think, Oh, Kim Jong-un was so embarrassed at Hanoi and that, you know, he, he, he'll never come back. And they forget that there was a lot of follow on contact. Like there were letters, there was a sudden summit in Panenjom, there were talks in Stockholm, which didn't go very well, but all through that, Kim Jong-un even apologized for some

of his short range missile launches that were ongoing after Hanoi. So I don't think that this necessarily means an end for, sorry, I've completely lost track of where I was. Do you think there are any internal... Oh yeah, sorry, thank you. Thank you for reminding me. Yeah, the point I was trying to make was that I think after Hanoi, there would have definitely been a lot of people around Kim Jong-un saying, look, this was a total embarrassment, but

yet he continued with those examples I've given. And so, I mean, at the end of the day, we know that he can decide to do whatever he wants within reason. And I think there will be advisors around him who are also aware that Russia may not be forever. China is angry, it seems, with North Korea right now, although still providing lots of strategic assistance. But it's good for North Korea to have options, right?

And so they're never ever, in probably our lifetimes, who knows how US politics will go, gonna have a president like Trump again, especially in a second term unbridled by a lot of the formalities in the first term and the learning curve and people like Bolton. So if I was advising Kim Jong-un, I'd say like, go for it, just try and get whatever you can from this because these, these conditions are never going to come back. Now let's talk about the possibility of either some conflict or some escalation. Now the question that people always like to throw around is does Trump's unpredictable nature make it more or less likely that unfriendly state and

non-state actors like Iran, Hamas, North Korea, Russia, et cetera, will be adventurous? Now Trump always says, and people who approach Trump say, if I'd been in the White House, you know, Russia wouldn't have invaded Ukraine or or what happened on October 7th in Israel wouldn't have happened and do you think that that will be something that'll be sufficient to discourage Kim Jong-un from maybe doing a seventh nuclear test or shelling an island or something like that? I mean, I don't know if you guys disagree, but I think Kim Jong-un is going to be very cautious about doing anything too, I hate this word, provocative, simply because of what has happened in the last six to 12 months in the Middle East.

I mean, Israel has shown, like really, put ethics aside, really sophisticated capabilities and Intel and targeted assassination we've seen the drones going into North Korea recently which have demonstrated like they have not got their defenses together in which is understandable it's hard to protect against and then also Trump did don't remember don't forget order the the killing of that general from Iran. I forgot his name, Soleimani, or yeah, in Iranian territory, what was it? I can't remember actually now if it was in Iran or not.

But the point being that Trump did take a couple of quite bold military moves that when you couple those with developments in very targeted, remote military strikes, would, if I was Kim Jong-un, I would just not want to shake that up. Yeah. Colin's thoughts? I think more, yeah, if he does something like a nuclear test now, then maybe he would maybe ruin some chances of a smooth start with Trump, something like to that effect.

But from Trump's perspective, and so that would just all be on Kim's own assessment of what kind of caution he needs to take. But from Trump's perspective, yeah, it's hard to predict because he's so narcissistic and invested in himself and he's, I don't think he wants to start a he's I don't think he Wants to start a war. I don't think he wants to do the the big threats to Kim Jong-un Like after his he all he talks about is how good of a relationship he has with Kim Jong-un

That's a he says that again and again and again his rallies that says to me that he's not gonna start You know saying this whole fire and fury thing is behind him That's that that whole line of thinking is not even in his head anymore. So you don't see any factors that could lead to an escalation? Well, only if North Korea did something like a small-scale attack, something that people have been saying is going to happen, this preparation for war, quote unquote. Full range missile test? Yeah, but I mean, well, even...

Ah, rather than a lofted trajectory of full range trajectory. And that, yeah. And so that would kind of be like a nuclear test. Does Kim actually take that risk? Does he kind of try to play his card first and say, I'm, I'm here Trump, like, I'm going to trust that you're not going to get mad at this. I don't know if that's going to happen. Yeah.

Well, I think I, my think my pet peeve with media headlines on North Korean missile tests or whatnot is, oh, this is a message to the US. It's a provocation aimed at the US election. They have been saying that for a year. Is it? Because what is North Korea's objective right now? It's not to provoke someone to get attention.

They already have the attention. They have already proven a lot of the capabilities compared to the past. They don't need the noise to get the attention. They need the capabilities and the right logic these days. So in the past two years, Kim Jong-un, it seemed like he was focusing a lot on making North Korea look like a normal state in not just military terms, but in general. And what does he want with Trump? He probably wants to get the recognition as a nuclear state. And for that, my guess is maybe he will continue the nuclear capability testing

with the projectiles and whatnot. But frame it in a more responsible manner so Trump feels more comfortable. We will do arms control instead because they look responsible enough. Suggesting arms control. Now, Trump's policy the first time around was largely focused on this nuclear issue,

nuclear and missiles with less emphasis on human rights. Do you expect this to continue? Should human rights be part of future negotiations or is this a distraction from the nuclear issue? Do you see Trump having an interest in that? I don't know if he would have an interest in that because, you know, again, that's Kim's red line and so that's a non-starter and Trump already knows that. Even if they get some deal done, the thing that Kim is never going to allow is to create a situation where his country opens up ideologically, information wise, that's never going to happen.

So I think there's a lot of room there to get Trump to agree to something like, again, like a small opening of a resort. But I don't think that's going to be on, on Trump's agenda, but I do wonder about, because one of his last letters also said, like, you know, I can't let the thing that we're working towards is for you to get rid of your nuclear burden and that he was saying that in one of his final letters in August 2019 so it just it seems like that's what he's gonna be focused on but this time around it's not gonna be denuclearization it's gonna be

arms control. I just heard he didn't have an ambassador on human rights to DPRK so I think Julie Turner the current current, uh, post holder will, will be dropped and not replaced likely. And you may remember also, I think there were a lot of questions during the first Trump presidency about financial support for voice of America, radio free Asia, national endowment for democracy. Uh, you know, if, if this is like a. Maga, like a true, like, make America great again, like just focus on ourselves,

then you could argue why are we spending all this money on promoting human rights overseas? And that actually could have a pretty devastating effect on the North Korea human rights community. A lot of NGOs, organizations are funded directly or indirectly by the US. And if that's all clobbered, it will have a lot of people lose their jobs.

South Korea will still continue to focus on that for the next two years because it's a big thing under the UN administration. Yeah. Okay. Now we're in the home stretch. We've got about six minutes left. So I've got some, some keywords here. I'd like some rapid fire thoughts from all of you on,

on each of them. What are the implications of Trump's second term on the, the rock US Alliance? Very bad. Okay. Quickfire thought. That's very quick. Yeah. Quickfire thought.

It's, it's just very bad. Defense cost sharing we We already discussed but also Just I think this is not just about Trump, but it's now about just American voters, right? Because it's the second time around we're seeing this again after all those four years where Trump tried to you know Trump hated alliances, right and he still does and for South Koreans They may have to just completely recalibrate with other partnering countries, what to do with this. If someone like Trump comes back to the White House in the future, God knows who. What do we do with the online? Do we still rely on the US on the, you know, favors for the Trump for the terrorist subsidies and the defense, defense reliance and

all that? What about trilateral cooperation with Japan, Japan, US, Korea, does that continue? Well, Japan has a new leader as well. So that's a variable. Okay, so we've got a couple of question marks there. Any follow up thoughts that all chat or Colin? On trilateralism, I mean, I think it could continue in the short to medium term,

but who knows? There's still trade issues between the three. Yeah, who knows how important it will continue in the short to medium term, but. There's still trade issues between the three. Yeah, who knows how important it will be in Trump's mind. Yeah, the first thing is to see how they trade the tariffs and all that go and how that splits them apart. Right. And then the second thing is, again, I think everything will boil down to joint drills.

That's the thing that Kim sees as the first sign of trust, the first big concession he needs. And now there are trilateral drills as well. Yeah, and the drills are the thing that have been built up so much over the last few years. And so if Trump prioritizes the North Korea issue, then that's going to go away, I think, the drills and then, you know. But with the exercises, I mean, there are people in the Trump orbit who see that as being a useful counterbalance and

deterrent effect upon China so they're not just Valuable here on the Korean Peninsula those who in the Trump orbit who want to work to send signals to China would still be interested in Keeping trilateral cooperation going. Yeah, they wouldn't do it on the they wouldn't do it on the peninsula then they would have they would have to not do it because Trump knows that that's Kim's top ask. Right. Now, US North Korea relations that we talked about this, but do we see it as likely that Trump will sort of try to pick up from where he left off? More of less than 50%?

I think it's a coin flip just because of all the other issues on his agenda. This is what I've been really grappling with is like how much weight does he put on like reinvesting in this topic, this unfinished chapter, right? There are arguments I think both ways and it's going to be, you know, it's really unpredictable. I think it might depend on what happens with other parts of the world where US is involved like Ukraine war in the Middle East. I think it might depend on what happens with other parts of the world where US is involved, like Ukraine war in the Middle East. I think he will do it. He will do it and he won't wait that long.

I think it's on his mind. He repeats it a lot. He'll see it as an easier task than many others. All he really has to do is... That I just mentioned. Yeah, that's true. Inter-Korean relations, are there any implications for that at all, those that have no effect? Jong-min?

South Korea will have no place in mediating anything between the US and North Korea relations. Not no, but compared to the Moon administration era, North Korea doesn't feel the same way about South Korea at all compared to that. But Moon Jae-in actually tweeted right after the Trump election and said, oh, really, congratulations. I remember really fondly of how we built the peace on the peninsula together. You're such a courageous leader. But there's one, so one thing that happened in the Trump administration was this poor child in the UK was run over by a US service person and the service person fled to the United States. The British parents were so angry. They were

like, I can't believe this. Trump negotiated for the parents to come over so he could give them a personal apology whilst also declining to stop the diplomatic community for that service person to be charged in the UK. And he turned it into this showbiz thing where the parents were there devastated and he had the service person in a room next door ready to bring out and I could just imagine something like this where Kim Jong-un is and Yoon is secretly in the next room Trump just says Kim we have to talk and wheels out president Yoon. Oh my god. Oh boy.

Ta-da. Show biz. Okay gosh Trump does like a big show. Let the show begin Showbiz. Okay. Gosh. Trump does like a big show. Let the show begin. But you like show as well. Any implications for North Korea's delegation to the United Nations in New York City? Yeah, I think that they'll be...

There were people that left New York City recently to go to Pyongyang. I can think of two officials and only one went back to New York. So I'd be watching that. Are they gonna send a couple more to replace some of the seats they've left empty? It just even in terms of monitoring it would be probably... That hasn't been a traditional spot for behind, you know, backdoor talks, right? Oh, well, no, the New York Channel was. It was used extensively through Obama administration and early Trump administration. Like letters and getting stuff like that through. And Biden administration tried to use it,

but it's been sort of suspended for the last few years. Now, last topic, back to alliances a little bit there. We know that Trump's also skeptical about NATO and the value of NATO. Now recently we've seen a lot of NATO interest in Indo-Pacific, stability and security, Korea joining the IP4. So what are the implications for NATO in Asia in this case? The world will learn to get on without the US if Trump is truly going to do what he says

he wants to do, which is to kind of become more isolationist or at least he'll go along with the alliances as long as he's convinced in his head that it's fair. So yeah, I think there's no choice. South Korea has to get closer with NATO and NATO will have to get closer together and they'll all have to kind of leave the US behind

in terms of how much they trust the US. Maybe they'll stay together, but you know. But NATO is not just the US. It's like much of it is actually European Union. So it really depends on what kind of game plan European Union has when it comes to gather, and the UK, sorry. To in how to you know gather the partners together and to, you know, just work it out and try to maintain the multilateralism and many different platforms. And that's a challenge right now for not just South Korea, but just many

parts of the country. Yeah, Europe. World. Yeah. 30 second final thoughts. Anyone? It's going to be a bumpy ride. So buckle up and get your NK Pro subscription, cause you're going to need

it more than ever. And I'm not just saying that like we saw some people, I think we saw decreasing interest in North Korea, but you really need to pay attention now. That's right. Go to NK news.org and subscribe because also this podcast itself will be going behind a paywall later on this month. That's correct. And, uh, we've, we've been signposting that, uh, for a thing of a couple of weeks, but the long form interviews,

I know many of you enjoy them. If you want them now, you're going to have to get the NK News membership. It's a dollar for the first month. And then there is a discount for podcast listeners that you can get 50% off for your first year. So at this time, uh, where so much is going to be happening, it's, you know, a great opportunity. Super cheap. Colin, final thoughts? Uh, I have no words. There are, there are no words.

Okay. Jongmin. Well, fighting. Yeah. That's going to be interesting. Four years. Thanks for all to all of you for coming on the show today to chat to Colin and to Jongmin and we'll see each one of

you again very soon. Thanks, Jack. Thank you very much. Thank you. Buckle up. Ladies and gentlemen, that brings us to the end of our podcast episode for today. Our thanks go to Brian Betts and Alana Hill for facilitating this episode and to our post-recording producer genius, Gabby Magnuson, who cuts out all the extraneous noises, awkward silences, bodily functions and fixes the audio levels. Thank you and listen again next time.