There are three questions worth considering about the planned meeting:
(1) Will It Actually Happen?
The meeting will reportedly be held “before May.” But a lot could go wrong between now and then. The Kim regime is not known for sticking to the letter of its agreements, but it is known for probing adversaries in search of weaknesses. Something like a surprise missile test, therefore, could scuttle the meeting. I’d estimate that there’s a not insignificant chance that the summit does not actually go forward.
(2) Where Will It Happen?
The North Koreans are likely to push for Pyongyang as the site of the meeting. For security reasons, Kim Jong-un is loath to leave North Korea—he hasn’t gone abroad even once since ascending to the throne—and the country’ s capital city would therefore seem a logical choice. Prior visits by U.S. dignitaries—Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Bill Richardson, uh … Dennis Rodman—have also occurred in Pyongyang.
The Trump administration should push hard to hold the meeting somewhere else, though. Not only is Pyongyang a grotesque theme park of totalitarianism which should not be dignified with a visit, but it would also provide Kim with something of a home-field advantage.
Panmunjom, the village cleaved in half by the DMZ, is a better option. But there also happens to be a Trump Tower in Seoul. Just saying.
(3) Why Is This Happening?
The Trump administration deserves credit here. It has clearly spooked the usually supremely self-confident Kim. Maximum pressure—the toughest sanctions ever leveled on the regime—plus threats of military action seem to have compelled a change in strategy from Kim.
Recall, this is a regime that literally did not pick up the phone for several years when its South Korean counterparts tried to reach it. Now, the Kims are hosting South Korean delegations and inviting the U.S. president for a visit. Even if these overtures are not being made in good faith (see #1), the gambit is not a sign of strength. Radical changes in the status quo are the hallmarks of a rattled regime.
Is the proposed meeting just an attempt to run out the clock while Kim puts the finishing touches on his ICBM program? Perhaps. But that the regime is even proposing this summit shows that its calculus has changed. And that is thanks to the Trump administration.
