Posted on 05/24/2018 4:23:05 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
A senior White House official says that the US is “still short” of applying maximum pressure to Pyongyang.
Hours after President Trump canceled his summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, Trump’s administration hinted that it might ratchet up sanctions against his country.
A senior White House official told reporters on Thursday that the administration’s goal is to “achieve maximum pressure” on Kim’s government using sanctions, and that “we’re still short of that.”
“It’s like painting the Golden Gate bridge,” the senior administration official said. “It starts peeling as soon as you finish, and so you have to keep a new coat of paint going just to maintain a certain level of pressure.”
The Trump administration has pursued sanctions as a pressure tactic to try to persuade Kim to halt his nuclear weapon and ballistic missile testing. At the United Nations, the US has successfully gotten multiple rounds of harsh sanctions passed, including a resolution in December that makes it harder for North Korea to import fuel and sell food to foreign countries.
It’s possible that additional sanctions — if powerful enough — could anger Kim and make a future summit less likely. And every time tensions between the US and North Korea rise, the likelihood of war breaking out between the two countries rises as well.
Naval blockade. Anything else is short of maximum.
They have a long border with China and Russia. They’re not an island.
“We’re all doooomed!”
VOX’s spin always cracks me up.
They have to please both Xi Jinping and the DNC.
North Korea’s long nightmare ends here and now.
Tighten the nuts.....
LOL!
“President Obama cancelled a meeting with Filipino President Rodrigo Duterte after the Filipino leader insulted Obama’s mother. “
https://www.npr.org/2016/09/06/492857811/obama-cancels-meeting-with-filipino-president-rodrigo-duterte-after-insults
The House needs to release the sex payments and check all of the phone booths for randomly lost laptops.
Get rid of Paul Ryan...boot his butt out the door.
When you get down to the “nut-cuttin’”, here are the options:
1) Kim fears his loss of power once peace is made;
2) NK people Kim will still be power if No deal is made.
I’m sure most of the people of the NK would secretly love to have a few nice things...like, er, FOOD.
Then there’s FREEDOM, MONEY, CARS, GASOLINE, and the list goes on.
I don’t know if they are aware all the millions that Kim, and former Kims, have harvested plenty of bucks from the USA, and others, have all gone to aggrandize the “dear leader”, and not them - a lot like the Clinton Foundation.
I think kimmy knows that a “reunifications” of the Korea means the end of his dictatorship, path to riches, and power. He wouldn’t work out well if given a job in a government run by SK, and, SK would be fools to hire him.
Maybe he could do like they say Hitler did, take the money and run to South America.
Kim wants to go back to playing tough.
Trump says in effect “OK, not my preference, but if that’s what you want let’s play.”
It has more to do with illicit fuel shipments
I think kimmy knows that a “reunifications” of the Korea means the end of his dictatorship, path to riches, and power. He wouldn’t work out well if given a job in a government run by SK, and, SK would be fools to hire him.
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There may be other issues but the one you highlight is really the only one that counts. Kimmy wants his country to look like South Korea someday but that goal falls well below his need to hold on to power.
But I’m a little more optimistic than you are that Trump can find a middle ground that keeps Kim in power minus his nukes while helping the North Koreans move into the 20th century. Or perhaps even the 21st.
The problem is that the guys who do disarm fully - Qaddafi and Saddam, had way worse outcomes than regimes who engage in arms control without fully disarming - Russia, Iran and North Korea. Kim would lose all of his leverage permanently if he denuclearized.
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