President Donald Trump has turned the staid world of international diplomacy on its head. He has abandoned conventional methods of careful, patient and cali-brated diplomatic negotiations. He has taken to ways he perhaps pursued in making large real estate deals: early adoption of maximalist positions, contra-dictory stances and surprising and strident comments. Much of this has been witnessed in the way Trump has dealt with North Korea—dire threats to his re-mark on March 8 that he was willing to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. The same yo-yo has continued even after the announcement on May 10 that the two leaders will meet in Singapore on June 12. Consider the somersaults:
On May 22 US Vice President Mike Pence said, “There was some talk about the Libyan model last week, and as you know, as the President made clear, this will only end like the Libyan model ended if Kim Jong-un doesn’t make a deal”. This was a red rag to the North Koreans who were already upset at National Security Advisor John Bolton’s reference to the Libya example. For North Korea the Li-byan model implies regime change. Hence, it took it as a deliberate provocation.
Pence’s comment after National Security Advisor John Bolton, who arouses a visceral reaction in Pyongyang, had mentioned in late April that the US objec-tive was to achieve ‘complete, verifiable, irreversible disarmament’ in North Korea as it had in Libya. Most observers believe that Kim Jong-un may be will-ing to freeze his arsenal, both nuclear weapons and missiles, but will not be amenable to destroying it altogether. That without his present stock he will be afraid of meeting the same fate as the late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
On May 24 a North Korean official called Pence a “political dummy” and threat-ened that the summit could be called off. However, on the same day North Korea destroyed its nuclear testing facility, a clear signal of its interest in going ahead with the meeting.
On May 24 itself Trump reacted. Through a letter to Kim he called off the summit because North Korea had displayed “tremendous anger and open hostility” in its “most recent statement”. Trump however, left an opening when he signalled a willingness to meet Kim ‘someday’. If the letter was per se surprising (Presidents, leave alone that of the US, do not publicly address such communications to their peers—such messages are conveyed through diplomatic channels) its conclusion was more so. Trump wrote “If you change your mind having to do with this most important summit please don’t hesitate to call me or write”. Again, such language is traditional to the business world, not of interstate relations.
On May 25 North Korea indicated a willingness to meet with the US at any time. It thus passed the onus of a cancellation of the summit back on to the US.
On May 26 Kim and Moon met at the demilitarized zone. Separately, Trump in-dicated that the summit may still be held as planned in Singapore.
On May 28 Trump revealed that a US team was visiting North Korea for prepara-tions for the summit. Media reports indicated that North Korean officials were visiting Singapore and the US in connection with the summit.
On May 29 in a tweet Trump noted, “meetings are currently taking place con-cerning summit” and thanked Pyongyang for the “solid response to my letter”.
As I write these lines serious meetings are on in Washington, in the demilita-rized zone between North and South Korea and in Singapore to finalise the summit. Yet it is not clear if it will actually take place or what will be its out-come. What is noteworthy is the public manner in which all this is being done. It marks a break from the quiet way in which conventional diplomacy arranged such potentially transformative events.
While Trump’s negotiating tactics cause confusion and turbulence do they achieve US objectives? The Korean game is still in play but an assessment, even if somewhat tentative, can be made of Trump’s some other initiatives.
One example, important for India, is Trump’s Afghanistan and South Asia poli-cy personally announced by him in July last year after six months of delibera-tion. Essentially, he threatened Pakistan with the direst consequences if it did not close the safe-havens it had provided to the Afghan Taliban on its territory. He also demanded that Pakistan should bring the Taliban to the negotiating table with the Afghan government. Initially, Pakistan was worried but within a few months realised that for all its bluster Trump’s policy was really no different from that of earlier US administrations in that no really painful or decisive ac-tion would be taken against it. It is true that by making the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) target Pakistan the US has caused discomfiture. By itself though it will not compel Pakistan to change course.
In cases where Trump has done what he pledged to do during the election cam-paign he did so only after a period of uncertainty as seen in the Iran nuclear deal. In abandoning it Trump took more than a year. Through the year there was speculation if he would really give up on a deal which his predecessor had made, thereby, breaking the norm that successor governments of major powers uphold such decisions of earlier governments to ensure global stability.
Given US’ pre-eminence the world has no alternative but to adjust to the ways of Trump.