The Trust But Verify Strategy with North Korea

OPINION — The “tremendous progress” with North Korea that President Trump has repeatedly claimed does not approach the success that Kim Jong Un has achieved, based on the status of negotiations as described by Trump’s own Special Representative for North Korea, Stephen Biegun.

Biegun said his meeting this week with his North Korean counterpart, Ambassador Kim Hyok Choi, is to plan for another Trump-Kim summit at the end of this month, during an appearance last Thursday at Stanford University. The purpose, he said, was to conclude “a roadmap of negotiations” going forward in “four streams of potential cooperation.”