When Kim Jong Un Helped Make History and Was Left Disappointed
The US President Donald Trump and North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un shocked the world in 2018 when they met in Singapore for the first ever US-North Korea leadership summit. The two leaders met two more times in 2019 in Hanoi, Vietnam, and at the Joint Security Area in Panmunjom, Korea.
The 2018 summit between the US and North Korea was a remarkable turn of events. The world was on pins and needles beforehand, waiting to see if the long peace that endured for seven decades on the Korean Peninsula would come to an end, as President Trump and Kim traded insults amidst escalating military tensions. When the North launched ballistic missiles, President Trump called Kim Jong Un the “Little Rocket Man.” Next, North Korea referred to Trump as a “dotard” – a medieval English phrase for imbecile.
Since China, North Korea, South Korea, and the United States signed the Armistice agreement to end the Korean War in July 1953, rising tensions, periodic episodes of violence, and the constant threat of war have ebbed and flowed for decades. Since then, the tit-for-tat between Pyongyang and Washington has become predictable for international observers. North Korea would threaten war and annihilation for imagined slights, while the United States claims that “all options are on the table” to counter North Korean transgressions. These options often include USAF B-2 or B-52 flyovers, vaguely hinting that a military response against the North is possible when everyone knows that it is not. This tit-for-tat pattern all changed in 2017. When Donald Trump took office as President for the first time, Kim Jong Un had been in charge of his country for a little over 5 years. During his first 5 years in power, Kim killed his uncle, his half-brother, and hacked into Sony Pictures Entertainment to prevent the release of the Seth Rogen and James Franco’s movie “The Interview,” in which a couple of inept journalists are recruited to assassinate the North Korean leader. These events, when coupled with a new US President who never held political office and had no foreign policy experience, caused the world to fear that Kim Jong Un and Donald Trump were leading their countries on a collision course.
The three US-North Korea leadership summits were historic and prevented possible military action in Korea, but it accomplished little else. The United States and North Korea returned to their original starting positions: Washington insisting on denuclearization and Pyongyang insisting on sanctions relief for trading away parts of its nuclear weapon and missile programs. However, it would be wrong to conclude that everything returned to the pre-Trump status quo and that there were no winners or losers. Kim Jong Un did not meet any of his objectives during the summits and, according to press reports, did not hide his disappointment in a letter to Trump. Kim is not likely to rush into another summit when President-elect Trump returns to the White House.
Leadership summits take place after months of staff work among various levels of government. When nations’ leaders meet, it is to finalize those agreements or hold signing ceremonies; it is never to undertake negotiations by themselves. President Trump’s critics would say that, in an effort to meet with Kim, US diplomats and policymakers had to short-cut the process and “rewarded” North Korea with a presidential summit when Kim did not deserve such recognition.
International observers can say the same thing about Kim Jong Un’s summit diplomacy. Kim spent political capital to meet with Donald Trump. A North Korean leader traveling far away from his country and stepping on to the world stage for the first time has value and political currency. For example, according to veteran journalist Don Kirk, South Korea paid hundreds of millions of dollars in the early 2000s to secure a summit with then-North Korean leader Kim Jong Il. Trump may have politically “rewarded” Kim Jong Un with a face-to-face meeting, but the US offered neither money nor sanctions relief. Kim lost the opportunity to leverage the first ever United States and North Korea leadership summit to gain tangible benefits for his country and failed to gain any concessions.
Older and Experienced
At 40 years old, Kim Jong Un is now a mature and tested leader who has been in power for 13 years. Kim has been a head-of-state longer than his counterparts in China, Japan, South Korea, and the United States. Since Kim assumed the mantle of leadership following his father Kim Jong Il’s death in December 2011, he has passed three tests. First, he successfully consolidated power, killing his powerful uncle Jang Song-Thaek, purging Jang’s followers, and silencing all doubts about who is in charge. Second, Kim Jong Un successfully tested and diversified the nuclear weapon and missile programs he inherited from his father. To this, he added a fearsome arsenal of cyberweapons that allowed him to take the fight straight to the United States and other global enemies. And third, perhaps learning from the failed United States summits, Kim achieved a semblance of global respectability he has long sought by other means. For example, Kim’s recent deployment of North Korean troops to fight with Russia in Ukraine is intended to project power across Eurasia and send a message of solidarity with North Korea’s old patron. With these three victories, Kim Jong Un is responsible for the greatest reversal of geopolitical fortune for North Korea since the end of the Cold War.
Kim Jong Un’s desire for international respectability is often overlooked as a key motivation for his decisions. In the footage of the three summits, we see that Kim is clearly enjoying himself. As delusional as it sounds, Kim Jong Un probably sees himself as the head of a nuclear superpower, holding a major advantage over much of the world in the only currency that matters in North Korea: the threat of force. Kim’s sister Kim Yo Jong recently referred to South Korea and Ukraine “as bad dogs bred by the US,” and that “military provocation against a nuclear weapons state” could lead to an “unimaginable” situation. In the Kim Family universe where “military first policy” reigns supreme, a nuclear-powered North Korea, desperately poor and weighed down by sanctions, ranks above South Korea, a G20 nation. Recent political disruption in South Korea—when President Yoon Suk Yeol tried to declare martial law and shut down the National Assembly—is likely to reinforce Kim’s self-perception of superiority.
Kim Jong Un now sees himself standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Russia, China, and the United States and before long he may try to stand a little taller. There is only one thing Pyongyang wants from Russia for sending soldiers to Ukraine: weapons development assistance, including in the fields of missile guidance and nuclear propulsion. North Korea with a nuclear triad would be a nightmare for the world and it may not be far away.
Korea Before the United States
The United States frequently falls into the trap of thinking that Pyongyang is obsessed with Washington and that everything North Korea does is to grab US attention. The United States-North Korea relationship and sanctions relief is a key priority for Pyongyang, but it is not the raison d’etre of the North’s national security strategy. The United States is the most important piece on the international chess board, but North Korea currently is not playing chess. It is playing a much simpler game close to home against South Korea. Instead of returning to summit diplomacy, the first encounter between the United States and North Korea in 2025 may be in South Korea.
South Korea, and not the United States, is North Korea’s biggest existential threat. The existence of Koreans living and thriving on the Peninsula— well-fed, free, and even wealthy—is a testament against Kim Family rule. It is also a vision of what is possible for North Koreans with political and economic reform. It must be especially galling for a descendant of an anti-Japanese resistance leader, Kim Il Sung, to watch the current South Korean administration prioritize relations with Japan and military cooperation against North Korea.
North Korea’s rhetoric against South Korea in 2024 has been alarming. The North not only severed physical ties—destroying remnants of North-South infrastructure built during the “Sunshine Policy” years of inter-Korean engagement in the early 2000s—it revised the country’s constitution to give up peaceful unification as a goal and declared the South to be the main enemy. South Korea is considered “foreign” and no longer deserving of familial considerations from North Korea. Long-time Korea watchers and former US officials, Bob Carlin and Siegfried Hecker, wrote in 2024 that they are worried Kim Jong Un may be preparing for a war on the Korean Peninsula. To this end, what kind of conclusions will Pyongyang draw from the latest political chaos in South Korea? Will North Korea see chaos in Seoul—large demonstrations and attempts to impeach President Yoon—as an opportunity to test South Korea, militarily or diplomatically?
If North Korea saw South Korea as a formidable adversary, President Yoon’s ill-advised move against the National Assembly helped erode the country's deterrence credibility against Pyongyang by raising doubts about the South’s civil-military relationship and durability of its institutions. What message would Kim Jong Un choose to send as a self-perceived leader of a nuclear superpower, if he feels South Korea is misbehaving or not respecting North Korea’s strategic superiority? How might the United States and South Korea step up to this challenge? All this remains to be seen.
When he returns to office in January, President Trump will find that the problem of North Korea has not gone away. North Korea’s nuclear forces are growing and missile tests are continuing. At some point in his second administration, Trump likely will have to weigh his choices and make tough decisions about North Korea. The President and his advisors should start by recognizing how much Kim Jong Un has matured as a leader in the last four years. Kim, emboldened by recent geopolitical successes, may be tempted to take bold action to show the world who is in charge on the Korean Peninsula. If he does, the United States must be prepared to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with its allies and show Kim Jong Un that he is not.
Yong Suk Lee is a former Deputy Assistant Director of the Korea Mission Center at CIA and a Senior Fellow, Asia Program, at the Foreign Policy Research Institute.
All statements of fact, opinion, or analysis are those of the author and do not reflect the official positions or views of the US government. Nothing in the contents should be construed as asserting or implying US government authentication of information or endorsement of the author’s views.