Trump will meet Little Rocket Man.
Jeffrey Lewis, director of the east Asia nonproliferation program at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies:
“This is literally the end of a North Korean movie – North Korea develops nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, compelling the US president to come to Pyongyang,” said Lewis, referring to a series called The Country I Saw.
“It’s an incredible coup for Kim. The message is that Saddam and Gaddafi disarmed.
They are dead,” he said. “Kim finished the nuclear weapons program. He gets a summit with the president of the United States.
“We should be talking to Pyongyang, but you don’t frontload the big concession.”Mark Landler at NYT:
Behind the scenes, events unfolded even more haphazardly. Mr. Trump was not scheduled to meet Mr. Chung until Friday, but when he heard that the envoy was in the West Wing seeing other officials, the president summoned him to the Oval Office, according to a senior administration official.
Mr. Trump, the official said, then asked Mr. Chung to tell him about his meeting with Mr. Kim. When Mr. Chung said that the North Korean leader had expressed a desire to meet Mr. Trump, the president immediately said he would do it, and directed Mr. Chung to announce it to the White House press corps.
Mr. Chung, nonplused, said he first needed approval from Mr. Moon, who quickly granted it in a phone call. Mr. Trump later called Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan, and the two discussed coordinating diplomatic efforts. Mr. Trump also plans to call President Xi Jinping of China.
