World War III

It is, at this point, undeniable that Kim Jong Un is a maniac.  His threats of nuclear attack seem to come every other week, and in between he commits outrageous crimes of humanity against his own people while portraying a facade of power and perfection.  For years, he and his father and grandfather before him have been a threat, but that is apparent now more than ever before.  The question is: how do we put a stop to him?  How do we squash this tiny man and his large threats?  The answer, I believe, can be found when acknowledging the following statement: the current President of our country is also, undeniably crazy.

Donald Trump’s strategy when dealing with the problem that is North Korea has been to provoke Kim Jong Un via news media and twitter.  In a September 23rd tweet, Trump referred to Kim as “Little Rocket Man” and threatened North Korea, saying they “won’t be around much longer!” (Kharpal).  To anyone who has been paying even the slightest bit of attention to Trump, this tweet came, really, as no surprise.  This strategy, while clearly not the best idea, is undoubtedly very ‘Trump.’  Trump’s antics over the past 9 months have been questionable and at times offensive to the point of absolute frustration.  But what does this have to do with a strategy for North Korea?  It is important to acknowledge that as long as Trump is in office, the smartest thing to do about North Korea is: nothing.  

When it comes to foreign policy, Trump is at the very least inexperienced.  Trusting him to have any real impact on the situation in North Korea is much like trusting a two year old with a set of matches and a can of gasoline: it’s simply not a good idea.  Instead, the best thing to do would be to continue Obama’s strategy of strategic patience (oh, the horror).  While this approach can be frustrating because of the lack of immediate gratification, it is the safest and, especially with Trump in office, the smartest possible option at this point.

The trick, however, will be to somehow get Trump on board with this plan and not allow him to tweet our country into a nuclear war.  While this is a dicey project and definitely no small feat, it is integral to the strategic patience strategy.  The best way to do this would be for the advice to come from the inside of Trump’s circle: however, this comes with its own struggles.  So far, it seems everyone in this circle agrees with Trump no matter what the consequences for them, Trump, or the country.  So, while this is the optimal route, it is nevertheless unrealistic.

Another possibility is to get rid of Trump’s social media, which wouldn’t completely solve the problem but would certainly be a step in the right direction.  This would prevent Trump from threatening to bomb the whole country of 23 million people into dust via his phone from the bathroom at 3am.  He would instead have to reserve his threats for daylight, which may spare us slightly from the unfiltered mind of Trump.  However, this option is also unlikely as Twitter thus far has refused to delete even some of Trump’s most offensive tweets because they are “newsworthy,” which apparently outweighs their strict policy against threats (Kharpal).  Therefore, it is unlikely we’ll be spared from The Tweets any time soon.

While strategic patience is undoubtedly the best strategy at this point when it comes to North Korea, the most difficult part of this strategy will be making Trump see this and agree to participate.  Trump is infamous for listening to nothing and no one, no matter how reasonable the argument and/or the person presenting it, especially when the argument sounds similar in any way to Obama.  Trump, much like Kim Jong Un, is an unpredictable fool.  But, if we can somehow get Trump to fall in line with Obama’s strategy, we may save ourselves from World War III.

Works Cited

Kharpal, Arjun. “Why Twitter Won't Take down Donald Trump's Tweet Which North Korea Called a 'Declaration of War'.” CNBC, CNBC, 26 Sept. 2017, www.cnbc.com/

2017/09/26/donald-trump-north-korea-twitter-tweet.html.





Daniel Madsen Comments:

First of all, shame on Twitter for being so selfish as to allow Trump to provide such an offensive base to publicize his platform. Excellent point there. I agree that strategic patience is the best course of action for the Trump Administration, but it is worrying as to how unrealistic that truly is. So that brings us to the main question: what can we actually do to stop him? What comes to mind for me is that Senator Murphy and a couple other members of Congress are drafting a bill that would ban Trump from making any decision to North Korea without congressional authorization. What is unfortunate about this bill is that it arguably might be unconstitutional, as the President is the sole negotiator of America in foreign affairs. This was established in the Supreme Court ruling of United States v. Curtiss Wright Export Group (1936).