The September 18, 2017 New Yorker had a very good article about Kim Jong Un by Evan Osnos.\u00a0 He made the point that we really have no idea what motivates him (or perhaps more importantly, would deter him).\u00a0 And, or course Kim Jong Un will have the same problem viewing Washington.\u00a0 We experienced similar ignorance about Saddam in 2002-3.\u00a0 Only afterwards did we learn a great deal about his incentives, goals, etc.\u00a0 Wisdom can come late and at great cost.\u00a0 It’s important to recognize that we are very ignorant about what Kim sees as a plus or a minus–and vice versa. Below is a letter I sent regarding this article and published in the New Yorker of October 16, 2017.<\/p>\n
TRUMP VS. KIM JONG UN<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n I directed the Iraq Survey Group, which detailed the absence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and, more important, the internal dynamics of Saddam Hussein\u2019s regime (\u201cOn the Brink,\u201d September 18th). Reading Evan Osnos\u2019s report about Kim Jong Un and North Korea, I noticed some striking parallels. Saddam made assumptions about President Bush and Washington that were wildly off the mark; he did not know what motivated Washington, and Washington did not know what motivated him. So it is now with Kim and Donald Trump. Osnos notes that there is no U.S. Embassy in Pyongyang. Similarly, the U.S. closed its Embassy in Iraq in 1990 and reopened it only after the invasion of 2003. This dramatically limited the number of Americans who had any contact with Iraqis inside Iraq. The quality of U.S. decisions\u2014and the understanding of the public\u2014suffered from that. The same will be true of North Korea.<\/p>\n Charles Duelfer<\/em><\/p>\n Fairfax, Va.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The September 18, 2017 New Yorker had a very good article about Kim Jong Un by Evan Osnos.\u00a0 He made the point that we really have no idea what motivates him (or perhaps more importantly, would deter him).\u00a0 And, or … Continue reading