There is no instruction book for being President of
the United States, and every new president has to learn on-the-job. Most do
this in measured ways, taking, or at least considering, the advice of their
senior foreign policy advisors before taking action. The incumbent, though,
goes about things in a unique, and uniquely dangerous way. I call it, DITTW, or
Do It the Trump Way. He blusters, threatens, demeans, and makes grandiose
pronouncements, only to have, in light of subsequent events, to walk everything
back into the corral.
The summit with North Korean leader Kim Jung-un is a
case in point. Trump started out with a war of words, promising ‘fire and fury,’
and calling Kim ‘the little Rocket Man,’ and then, after the North Koreans
finally agreed to a meeting and released three Americans they’d been holding
prisoner, calling Kim, ‘honorable.’ Of course, his bombastic national security
advisor, John Bolton, put his spoon in the soup, referring to the ‘Libya option’
in regard to North Korea’s nuclear program, which caused them to threaten to cancel
the whole thing.
Now, with North Korea dismantling an already destroyed
nuclear facility with international press witnesses, Trump has cancelled the
planned June 12, meeting in Singapore with ‘regret.’
In my humble opinion, as someone who had over 30 years
of experience as a diplomat, and several years working on Korean issues, both
north and south, a firm date for a leader summit should never have been
announced before many preparatory meetings were held, and it should have been
realized from the outset that North Korea is not about to unilaterally give up
the only thing it sees as protecting it from the U.S. A more stable, wise
person would’ve done this analysis before making public statements and promises
and would listen and heed the advice from a variety of knowledgeable people
before making any decisions. Unfortunately, this is not the case, and some hard
lessons are being put forth—I hesitate to say that they are being learned,
because, frankly, I have my doubts. We can only hope that the current situation
does not go beyond another ‘war of rhetoric.’
Life teaches hard lessons, but only for those who are
willing to learn. Too often, though, it is those of us outside the classroom
who suffer the consequences when the ‘students’ refuse to learn.
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