Analysis: Trump ‘smart cookie’ talk on Kim baffles Seoul
SEOUL, Korea, Republic Of — U.S. presidents looking to halt North Korea’s push for nuclear weapons over the years normally haven’t had very kind words to describe its dictators. George W. Bush, for instance, called the late Kim Jong Il a “pygmy.”
So it’s little wonder that South Koreans are bewildered by President Donald Trump’s use of the term “smart cookie” to refer to current leader Kim Jong Un, and by Trump’s assertion that he’d be “honoured” by a possible meeting. Some South Korean media described Trump as a “rugby ball,” an expression that suggests unpredictability.
Trump’s swing from hints of military action to praise for Kim highlights an odd reality: South Koreans, not easily rattled by their nuclear bomb testing neighbour to the north, find themselves increasingly baffled by the new leader of their strongest ally and military protector, the United States.
The worry is that Trump, a neophyte when dealing with North Korea, perhaps the most successful geopolitical manipulator of big powers in Asia, maybe the world, might fall prey to something the North has long coveted: A bilateral peace deal with the United States that would formally end the Korean War, which stopped in 1953 only after a cease-fire, and remove the nearly 30,000 U.S. troops helping guard the South from North Korean adventurism.