Opinion: Donald Trump and Xi Jinping are at an impasse on how to deal with North Korea
Both sides have largely unrealist expectations of each other, but at least they are talking
Xi Jinping’s meeting with America’s volatile new president promises some measure of clarity as to how the North Korean issue will play out between Beijing and Washington in the coming years.
By now, most readers will have formed strong views about US threats of a pre-emptive strike on North Korea, or the unavoidable controversy over the Terminal High Altitude Area Defence (THAAD) anti-missile system and its attendant strategic and commercial anxieties.
But less clear than either of these rather binary debates are questions of how the United States will seek to push Chinese sanctions enforcement and trade with North Korea. How far will Trump’s government tighten the screws against China in retaliation for perceived sanctions violations or questionable transactions with North Korea by Chinese firms?
Trump’s unusually arrogant, thrusting approach to just about everything he does naturally attracts attention. (Consider the fact that making Xi wait one hour for him to arrive from Washington was probably not the most offensive thing he did on Thursday).
When it comes to North Korea policy, Trump was true to form, making headlines in a Financial Times interview whose rough words for China were probably more reflective of Trump’s poor preparation and incontinent approach to briefing data than a finely honed new US approach to the related issues.
