Victor Cha: N. Korea's Kim Jong-un Could Push for Summit with Trump After U.S. Midterms

A prominent U.S. expert on North Korea has suggested that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un could pursue a summit with U.S. President Donald Trump if he adopts an unconventional, revisionist strategy.

Victor Cha, Korea Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), made the projection in an issue analysis piece published on the CSIS website on the 13th local time, titled "After Iran: Scenarios for Resuming the Trump-Kim Summit."

"If Kim adopts a revisionist stance, he could target a summit with Trump to reaffirm the fundamental principles of the Singapore Joint Statement adopted at their first summit in 2018," Cha stated.

The Singapore Joint Statement centers on four main points: establishing new U.S.-North Korea relations, building a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula, efforts toward the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, and recovering the remains of prisoners of war and missing personnel.

Cha projected that the timing for Kim to push for a summit "potentially comes after the ruling party (Republicans) loses the U.S. midterm elections," adding, "The two leaders are likely to avoid detailed denuclearization negotiations and leave it to their respective negotiating teams to flesh them out over the subsequent six months."

The prerequisite for this, according to Cha, is whether Chairman Kim holds revisionist tendencies.

He explained that if Kim harbors a revisionist perspective, he may attempt to leverage every possible opportunity to achieve his core objective of solidifying North Korea's status as a nuclear weapons state.

While conventional wisdom suggests that North Korea—having grown closer to Russia through troop deployments for the war in Ukraine and planning to expand trade cooperation with China—would not want a summit with President Trump, Cha analyzes that Kim could break away from this convention.

As an example, he pointed to how Kim broke from conventional expectations that he would focus on post-pandemic trade recovery with China, instead drawing closer to Russia as it wages war in Ukraine.

Furthermore, because President Trump has shown a fluid stance, such as maintaining the goal of North Korean denuclearization while simultaneously acknowledging North Korea as a "nuclear weapons state," Cha forecasts that "Kim Jong-un could seize an opportunity in resuming relations with Trump."

Cha also noted that North Korea's observation of President Trump's diplomatic and negotiating tendencies through the Iran war heightens the possibility of a U.S.-North Korea summit.

He stated, "In America's 'post-diplomacy' world, major deliverables take grand forms but are tacked on with promises of follow-up talks rather than prospects for actual agreements," adding, "North Korea has learned another lesson: that the best way to manage an unpredictable Trump who favors using military force is to maintain contact."

If a summit takes place, Cha projected, "Kim Jong-un will appeal to Trump's pursuit of a Nobel Peace Prize, steering the conversation toward topics like concluding a peace treaty, halting U.S. military exercises, and ending hostile relations." He added, "While tangible outcomes may be sparse, it would hold immense significance for North Korea's long-sought goal of 'de facto recognition by the U.S. as a nuclear weapons state.'"

Cha further forecasted that such revisionism could lead to a summit between Chairman Kim and Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, through which Kim might aim to fracture the trilateral cooperation framework among South Korea, the U.S., and Japan.

However, Cha predicted that a U.S.-North Korea summit would not lead to dialogue or exchanges with South Korea, noting, "Rather than the 'peaceful coexistence' proposed by the Lee Jae-myung administration, a revisionist diplomatic strategy bypassing Seoul to reach out to Washington and Tokyo would be most attractive [to North Korea]."

Regarding China, he anticipated that given the current geopolitical power dynamics, Beijing might push for a resumption of Trump-Kim diplomacy, explaining, "This is largely intended to curry favor with Trump, but also with the covert objective of diluting Russia's growing influence over North Korea."


※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.