President Trump’s overt shutdown submission to Democrats, agreeing to open the government in return for a simple bipartisan border conference in Congress, will meet warm favor in China and North Korea. Fair or unfair, the president will be perceived by those nations as someone who blinks when the negotiations get tough.
For U.S. foreign policy interests, that’s a huge problem.
Washington has significant interest in reaching near-term agreements with Beijing and Pyongyang. In China’s case, the U.S. interest is a deal that reduces Beijing’s intellectual property theft, reduces its state subsidies, and increases its conformity with World Trade Organization rules. In North Korea’s case, the interest is a deal that sees that nation surrender its nuclear weapons and long-range ballistic missiles. But with both nations renowned for their exceptionally tough negotiating strategies, getting good deals was always going to be a big ask. The shutdown deal will make it harder.
After all, Xi Jinping and Kim Jong Un (and Kim Jong Un’s hard-liner chief adviser, Kim Yong Chol) have now seen that Trump is willing to blink on the most personal of his political ambitions: a great wall at the U.S.-Mexican border. Yes, Trump has said he will use an emergency declaration to build the wall if no compromise can be reached with Democrats over the next three weeks. But that declaration is almost certainly doomed at the Supreme Court. It’s a threat with few teeth and understood as such.
The perception of Trump’s negotiating prowess is what matters if China and North Korea are to make concessions. But now those nations have reason to believe Trump is mostly talk: that when push comes to shove, Trump falls off his parapet and relinquishes the walls of his power.
This is not to say that all is lost. China’s economic slowdown motivates Xi’s accession to some measure of compromise. Kim fears Trump’s threat to use military force. Still, Kim is already showing signs of escalation against the U.S. So Trump must be clear-eyed here: In compromising on one major issue he will be seen by adversaries as willing to compromise on many others.
To remedy this situation, Trump must now be willing to cancel talks with China and North Korea. If he goes into those talks with a perceived deal-at-all-costs attitude, the U.S. will be the big loser.
