North Korea tag-team diplomacy takes a hit as Trump learns that loose lips sink summits

A carefully worded letter from US President Donald Trump to Kim Jong-un threw cold water on the planned June 12 summit with the North Korean ruler in Singapore, but left the door open to meeting at another time and/or place. The key question is whether this is a setback or a breakdown in the process. For now, however, the takeaway is that loose lips sink ships – and summits. 

On the US side, instead of one person or department taking the lead – Secretary of State Mike Pompeo would have been logical, having previously met Kim twice – there was a cacophony with National Security Adviser John Bolton and Vice-President Mike Pence chiming in with statements that infuriated the North. There was also the facile assumption that the Max Thunder exercise would get a pass from Pyongyang as had Foal Eagle. 

More fundamentally, the gulf is wide and deep between the two sides, lacking a common definition of denuclearisation or a timetable for phasing out the North Korean arsenal in exchange for security assurances, a peace treaty, sanctions relief and economic assistance. One possibility would be to take advantage of the apparent chemistry between Kim and Pompeo to work up a future summit following preparatory meetings. This could take place following a cooling-off period before or after South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s scheduled trip to Pyongyang in the autumn. 

The two sides are already heavily invested in a diplomatic process with no dearth of activity on and around the peninsula. In the space of a fortnight, Kim flew to China to meet President Xi Jinping, Pompeo landed in Pyongyang to pin down details in advance of the summit, Moon and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang showed up in Tokyo for a three-way summit with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and, this week, Moon touched down in Washington, briefing Trump on the takeaways from his own summitry with Kim.