Tag: Peace Talks

Ending Afghanistan

Our longest war has been raging for nearly 18 years and our troops have had multiple deployments with multiple chances to being killed or maimed…….it is time for this insanity to end……

I read where SecState Pompeo is trying to end this war…….

Speaking at Texas A&M University, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that US negotiations with the Taliban are trying to end the longest war in US history, and that a goal is trying to “broker peace between the Taliban and the Afghan government.”

Negotiations have been ongoing for months, and have established a growing understanding with the Taliban. The US and Taliban have the framework of a deal, where the US withdraws from Afghanistan and the Taliban keeps the ISIS and al-Qaeda out.

Pompeo’s talk of brokering peace between the Taliban and the Afghan government is unusual, as the US has largely kept this on the back-burner, and the Taliban has shown no interest in talking with the Ghani government.

There have been some talks involving an Afghan committee this week. The Ghani government has been reluctant to endorse the US negotiations so far, complaining that the US isn’t directly including them in decision-making.

Seriously?

If anyone in DC wanted this war to end…then it would! It is that damn simple.

Or maybe some sort of international solution….I mean after all we have international partners in Afghanistan……

We cannot fight our way to peace and stability in Afghanistan. If we have learned anything after 40 years of continuous war there, it is that a myopic focus on military solutions will not lead to peace. The path to stability does not depend on the number of U.S. troops in the field or the number of Taliban leaders killed.

Sustainable peace in Afghanistan requires an economy that can satisfy the needs of its people. While Afghanistan is rich in natural resources, it cannot harvest them to the fullest without the stability and good governance required for business to grow and thrive.  

https://www.realclearworld.com/articles/2019/04/16/afghanistan_needs_an_international_solution_113006.html
 
Or  better idea is that the US get out of everywhere…..bring the troops home for a well deserved rest…..

Many commentators argue that the U.S. political system has become increasingly polarized, pointing to the prolonged shutdown of the federal government as evidence. However, the difference between Democrats and Republicans in Washington is one of style, not substance, as revealed by the history of bipartisan support for U.S. intervention and occupation abroad. Republican administrations may be more frequently associated with U.S. invasions, but establishment Democrats have long backed the policies of U.S. imperialism. 

This is, in part, because U.S. interventionist foreign policy is driven by capitalist ideals, shared across the aisle by those in power in Washington. In order to sustain a profitable capitalist economy, there must be a continuous expansion of markets and increase in consumption. This capitalist imperative has been influential in shaping a U.S. foreign policy of invasion, destruction and resource extraction during open-ended wars. In 1971, the Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano famously described this extractive relationship as “the open veins of Latin America.” The rhetoric of defending democracy, which was used to justify the invasion of Syria as well as the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, has always been a cover story for neo-colonialism.

http://inthesetimes.com/article/21846/war-militarism-imperialism-invasion-iraq-syria-afghanistan-isis-troops

We must end our useless wars……but how to do so?

After decades of catastrophe, the same basic strategy endures. Donald Trump’s presidency makes plain that global supremacy has become an end in itself, unmoored from the interests of the American people and most of humanity. “Our military dominance must be unquestioned,” Trump has declared, “and I mean unquestioned.” Trump has stripped supremacy of ethical pretense and strategic justification. He values it for its own sake, as a gesture of brute domination.

What have liberals to say about this? Scandalously little. For decades, they have failed to stop war and violence for the same reason they have failed to reverse soaring inequality. At best, they have offered solutions inadequate to the scale of the problem. At worst, they have denied there was a problem, casting endless war as “global leadership.” Few Democrats will admit, for example, that not one power in the Middle East poses an existential threat to the United States, not one merits devoting precious lives and scarce resources to such misadventures as Saudi Arabia’s proxy war in Yemen.

https://newrepublic.com/article/153239/end-endless-war-case-against-american-military-supremacy

All in all….make peace as profitable as war and we will see an end to these conflicts…..yes, Irene, it is that f*cking simple!

Hampton Roads

This sounds a bit like some tourist trap in the making, right?  Or maybe one of those romantic dramas on the Hallmark Channel, right?

As a history buff I am always trying to learn more about American history….the stuff that was seldom taught in schools for various reasons…..

We all learn in school about the surrender of the Confederate forces at Appomattox in 1865…..but how many know of the peace conference before that?

Civil War historians have dismissed the Hampton Roads Peace Conference of February 3, 1865, in which President Abraham Lincoln and Secretary of State William H. Seward met with Southern representatives or “commissioners,” as a fruitless and relatively unimportant episode occurring two months prior to the surrender of the Confederate armies. [1] One prominent scholar in his history of the Lincoln presidency has completely ignored the meeting. [2] Other historians cite the results of the conference as additional proof of Lincoln’s “strategy of unconditional surrender” in the war. [3] David Donald in his magisterial biography of Lincoln asserts that the president did not expect to achieve any real results at Hampton Roads. According to Donald, Lincoln’s purpose in meeting with the rebel commissioners was not peacemaking; it was “to undermine the Jefferson Davis administration” by appealing to the discontented Southern masses’ longing for peace. “He wanted to raise their hopes, if necessary through a campaign of misinformation,” including the prospect “that at least the remnants of their ‘peculiar institution’ could still be saved.” [4]

Historians are probably correct in concluding that an end of the conflict based on Abraham Lincoln’s terms—the restoration of the Union and the destruction of slavery—was not possible until the surrender of Confederate armies in April. At Hampton Roads, Southern representatives, on instructions from Jefferson Davis, rejected out of hand any peace that failed to recognize Confederate independence or provide for a cease-fire. Though the Hampton Roads Conference did not produce peace, it was more important than historians have judged, particularly in regard to Lincoln’s purposes and concerns during the last few months of the war and the Northern reaction to his peace effort. Furthermore, a history of the conference can provide insights into Lincoln’s late-war leadership, his emancipation and reconstruction policies, and his standing among contemporaries before his apotheosis as an American icon.

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/j/jala/2629860.0021.104/–hampton-roads-peace-conference-a-final-test-of-lincolns?rgn=main;view=fulltext

Granted the conference was unsuccessful but that should not preclude the teaching of the attempt to reach a peace before the actual signing of the surrender.

Learn Stuff!

Class Dismissed!

Afghanistan: Is Peace Near?

After 18 years of constant war and multiple deployments the US is looking at the peace process taking shape…..

The US gets bad press worldwide…..the American propaganda machine we call the MSM does not pile on….but the news is not good for America…..like the number of civilian deaths……

According to UN officials, the 2018 civilian death toll in Afghanistan was a record high, with 3,804 killed and another 7,189 wounded. This was an approximately 11% increase over the previous year, and the highest annual figure since the UN began keeping track in 2009.

The report concluded that both an increase in suicide attacks, mainly from ISIS, and a sharp increase in US airstrikes were driving the record deaths, with over 1,000 casualties just from US air operations.

The Taliban were blamed for the largest number of civilian casualties, at 37%, which is in keeping with UN reports of the past. The Afghan government, US, and NATO were blamed for 24%, and ISIS was blamed for a further 20%. This is a huge number of ISIS killings given how comparatively small the group is.

The UN said a particularly concerning fact was that the civilian casualties from US airstrikes were overwhelmingly women and children. This, however, should be unsurprising, as the US tends to define adult men in Afghanistan as “suspects” or “militants” simply by virtue of being in a strike.

(antiwar.com)

With those numbers rising the parties involved are meeting and discussing an end to the hostilities……

A new round of negotiations on Afghanistan has begun on Monday in the Qatari capital city. A delegation of US diplomats and top Taliban figures, including deputy Taliban leader Mullah Baradar, are present for what is sure to be the highest level of talks yet.

18+ years into the US war in Afghanistan, they’ve gone from the Taliban denying negotiations were even taking place, to confirming they are. Progress is now being confirmed by both sides, with a basic framework of a war-ending deal in place.

That deal, specifics not-withstanding, are that the US would withdraw all troops from Afghanistan, and the Taliban would ensure that neither al-Qaeda nor ISIS could operate inside of the country in the future.

Having Mullah Baradar and US negotiator head Zalmay Khalilzad sitting across the table from one another only underscores how serious the talks are getting, and this latest round of talks is expected to continue hammering out specific details.

(antiwar.com)

I read dissertation papers that grad students submit and this one covers the “Long War” in Afghanistan and the possibility of a peaceful settlement…..

During the last week of January, the news was awash with stories covering the current administration’s ostensibly unprecedented progress with Special Envoy Khalilzad’s recent talks with the Taliban and their Pakistani sponsors in Qatar. In a statement that the U.S. Embassy Kabul released on the last Monday in January, Khalilzad stated that the peace talks had made progress on important issues and that the negotiators had agreed on a framework for further talks in February. In the eighteenth year of a long and stalemated war, there are reasons to be sanguine about these developments, to some degree, simply because this seems to have been the most talk about peace among the belligerents yet in this long hard war. And Mr. Khalilzad is indeed one of the best people to be the U.S. envoy leading the talks given his Afghan origins and years of experience as ambassador in Afghanistan and Iraq

However, there are also reasons for much caution and some alarm about the current progress and the potential for peace in Afghanistan since the deliberations and decisions about many previously intractable issues still require prudence and patience.  These details may potentially augur the gravest consequences for Afghanistan, its neighbors, and the U.S. Several things of great importance have yet to be worked out. There is still much uncertainty in what outcomes these talks will result in, and looming yet elusive peace also brings up questions and concerns about the Taliban’s and their sponsor’s true intentions.

https://www.e-ir.info/2019/02/26/a-looming-peace-for-afghanistans-long-hard-war/

This could be good news….or it could be just a lull in a continuing situation….

light at the end of an excruciatingly long tunnel, the prospect of American withdrawal from Afghanistan now seems to glimmer ahead. Several rounds of negotiation in Russia, Qatar, and elsewhere have produced the outlines of an agreement. Details are unknown, but by all accounts, the accord will be based around a simple deal: the United States pulls its troops out and the Taliban pledges to never again host terror groups.

This would be a most un-American peace deal. Rather than a declaration of victory, it would be a reluctant acceptance of stubborn facts on the ground. Afghans repelled British invaders in the 19th century and Soviet invaders in the 20th. For nearly two decades they have held the United States at bay. By leaving Afghanistan to its fate, we would be admitting failure. This horrifies many in Washington. Americans fervently embrace the illusion that their country can succeed at anything — including crushing mountain fighters thousands of miles away who believe they are patriots resisting a foreigner invader.

https://outline.com/RwCTAB

I wish I could see this as a good thing for the people of Afghanistan….but I cannot….the Taleban when returned to power will revert to their extreme shelf…..a restrictive form of Islam will once again rule the land….

Afghanistan has another worry….the hostilities between India and Pakistan…..there is a possibility that hostilities could spill over into Afghanistan….

Fearing a dangerous spillover impacts from increased tensions between India and Pakistan, war-ravaged Afghanistan has advised its nuclear-armed neighbors to exercise the utmost restraint.

On Wednesday, February 27, the Pakistan Air Force claimed to have shot down two Indian aircraft inside Pakistani airspace, a day after India said it struck hideouts of the Jaish-e-Mohammad militant group – responsible for a deadly suicide attack in Kashmir– inside Pakistan.

India blames Pakistan-based JeM for killing more than 40 Indian security forces in the troubled Kashmir valley on February 14.

https://thedefensepost.com/2019/02/28/afghanistan-india-pakistan-spillover/

The only good thing is that American troops will come home and get the rest they richly deserve.

Let’s say that a peace plan is negotiated……what does that mean to US troops?

Ongoing US-Taliban peace negotiations, designed to end the 18-year Afghan War, has a new proposal, with the Pentagon having finally offered a formal plan for withdrawing US forces from Afghanistan.

As with the usual Pentagon plans, there seems to be reticence toward actually doing this in a timely fashion. The plan reportedly would have half of the 14,000 US troops leaves Afghanistan within a matter of months, but then the rest would stay for as long as five years.

The end of the five years would see not only all US troops out of Afghanistan, but also NATO troops. It is said to enjoy support within NATO and among administration officials. It’s not clear what the Taliban’s position is, however.

And that might be a tough sell for the Taliban. After resisting a US occupation for 18 years, the Taliban’s demand is to get the US out of the country, and while the logistics of that might take awhile, five years is a very long time.

If anything, such a long time is likely to raise fears that the Pentagon is dragging its feet specifically to give officials time to change their minds and dishonor the deal, and keeping thousands of troops inside Afghanistan means Trump, or his successor, could end up resuming the war.

(antiwar.com)

US troops are the key to any peace deal with the Taleban…..

Suhail Shaheen, a spokesman for Taliban’s political office in Qatar, told reporters in Qatar that the war will come to an end in the country and the Taliban fighters will join the ranks of the Afghan army if the two sides sealed an agreement on the withdrawal of foreign forces from Afghanistan.

He said talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government is an internal issue and that Taliban is currently carrying out talks with the US about troop withdrawal.

“When the occupation is ended, there is a full withdrawal of foreign troops from Afghanistan and there is an Afghan-inclusive Islamic government in the country, I think there is no need for any military operation and war. So, there will be a sustainable peace in the country and all the military people and our people, they will be included in a national army,” said Shaheen.

https://www.tolonews.com/afghanistan/taliban-sees-troop-withdrawal-key-peace

Appears as troops are the main condition for peace in Afghanistan….

I say bring ’em home!

Peace For Afghanistan?

After close to 18 years of US involvement in the armed conflict in Afghanistan there is a rumble of a possible peace within the country.

Personally, I say about damn time….what took so long?

An op-ed that appeared in Truthdig…….

It has been more than nine years since I resigned in protest over the escalation of the Afghan War from my position as a Political Officer with the US State Department in Afghanistan. It had been my third time to war, along with several years of working in positions effecting war policy in Washington, DC with the Department of Defense (DOD) and the State Department. My resignation in 2009 was not taken lightly by my superiors and my reasons for opposing President Obama’s “surge” in Afghanistan found support amongst both military officers and civilian officials at senior levels in Kabul and Washington.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/02/15/time-for-peace-in-afghanistan-

and-an-end-to-the-lies/

Peace may be a pipe dream for Afghanistan….but with that said what would it take to get peace for Afghanistan?

Peace may be offering…the legislative body of Afghanistan, the Jirga, will be meeting to discuss peace talks….

Afghan politicians and tribal, ethnic, and religious leaders are set to meet for at least four days next month to discuss negotiations with the Taliban, President Ashraf Ghani’s special peace envoy has said.

Daudzai said that the consultative Loya Jirga will discuss the government’s “values and red lines” and will aim to come up with a framework for the Western-backed government in Kabul to engage in peace negotiations with the militant group.

https://www.rferl.org/amp/afghan-loya-jirga-to-convene-next-month-to-discuss-peace-talks/29781362.html

Constant military surveillance of Afghans yields almost no real intelligence about the problems they face each day. An unusual group of volunteers uses a far different approach.

 

 

Hossein, a member of the Afghan Peace Volunteers, (APV), which hosted my recent visit to Afghanistan, rolled up his sleeve to show me a still-healing three-inch wound. Thieves had broken into his family home in Kabul. When they were discovered, one of the robbers stabbed Hossein.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/02/15/what-it-really-takes-to-secure-peace-in-afghanistan/

I have been calling for an end for this madness…of course I am just a small voice in the wilderness but at least now there are more people seeing the need for an end to the war in Afghanistan for now all we are doing is throwing people and cash into a hole that will NEVER fill.

Give peace a chance….you might like it!

Camp David–40 Years On

Closing Thought–17Sep18

Forty years ago today, 17 September…..Pres, Carter, PM Begin and Egypt’s Sadat met for 2 weeks at Camp David and came away with a peace agreement signed by all sides…..

At the White House in Washington, D.C., Egyptian President Anwar el-Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin sign the Camp David Accords, laying the groundwork for a permanent peace agreement between Egypt and Israel after three decades of hostilities. The accords were negotiated during 12 days of intensive talks at President Jimmy Carter’s Camp David retreat in the Catoctin Mountains of Maryland. The final peace agreement–the first between Israel and one of its Arab neighbors–was signed in March 1979. Sadat and Begin were jointly awarded the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts.

A state of war had existed between Egypt and the State of Israel since the establishment of Israel in 1948. In the first three Arab-Israeli wars, Israel decisively defeated Egypt. As a result of the 1967 war, Israel occupied Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, the 23,500-square-mile peninsula that links Africa with Asia. When Anwar el-Sadat became Egyptian president in 1970, he found himself leader of an economically troubled nation that could ill afford to continue its endless crusade against Israel. He wanted to make peace and thereby achieve stability and recovery of the Sinai, but after Israel’s stunning victory in the 1967 war it was unlikely that Israel’s peace terms would be favorable to Egypt. So Sadat conceived of a daring plan to attack Israel again, which, even if unsuccessful, might convince the Israelis that peace with Egypt was necessary.

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/camp-david-accords-signed

This was the closest the Middle East had come to peace in many years and within a short period….Sadat had been assassinated and Begin also….Carter was replaced with Reagan and from that point on peace was never on the agenda.

The world missed the perfect opportunity to have a lasting peace….and history has shown just how bad events have gotten since those days 40 years ago.

Unification Blues

There is much optimism around the Korean talks…..some are even looking forward to a possible unification of the two Koreas….they look toward the Vietnam of the 70’s and later the unification of Germany of the 90’s……

Yes the idea is very promising indeed….or is it?

The North and South have fundamentally diametric economic and political systems and national ideologies. They also have very large guns pointed at each other’s head. Neither side has much reason to trust the other to refrain from trying to exploit the chaos that would come with a transition and force reunification on their own terms. This trust gap is not going away, nor is the prisoner’s dilemma. True reunification would require breathtaking courage from leaders on both sides, who would need to ignore immediate incentives and assume enormous risk while going through the process.

This is, in part, why only two modern states have achieved negotiated, peaceful reunification. One was Yemen in 1990, and its experience ever since has been nothing anyone wants to replicate. The more instructive comparison is Germany, which reunified the same year. Prior to being sliced in two by outside powers, both Germany and Korea were cohesive cultural, linguistic and ethnic entities. Yet both became locked in a protracted zero-sum contest for supremacy between their competing halves. Both are surrounded by countries that, through the long-term lens of their own geopolitical imperatives, would rather see them stay divided. Both had U.S. troops stationed on half their home soil. And like the North, East Germany suffered greatly from the loss of Soviet aid and security.

https://geopoliticalfutures.com/korea-cant-replicate-germanys-reunification/

A fanciful thought…..but we must get past rigorous negotiations before anything can move forward.

I wish I could say that I see a way forward….but with this bunch it is highly unlikely.

“Peace In Our Time”

The famous words uttered by UK PM Chamberlain after the peace deal he brokered with Hitler back in the 1930’s.  And it did NOTHING to prevent war or secure a peace.

It makes me think when I hear about the possibility of an agreement between North and South Korea…..could this be the legacy that is needed for a Trumpian win?

It would go a long way for a more positive outlook in the future….but why on the Peninsula and not anywhere else?  An interesting question that more people should ask…..

Even while the Trump administration looks increasingly likely to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal on May 12, it is simultaneously preparing for an historic summit with North Korea’s Kim Jong-un, as part of an effort to negotiate a nuclear deal with Pyongyang. This contradictory, disjointed approach to non-proliferation is consistent with the style of a leader like President Trump, who seems to view foreign policy as a random collection of individual business deals rather than a single grand coherent strategy with an overarching goal; more often than not, there seems to be a lack of strategic linkages to US national interests. It is downright peculiar that the Trump administration is actively sabotaging the nuclear deal with Iran while simultaneously engaging in high-level talks with North Korea in an effort to negotiate nuclear constraints.

https://thebulletin.org/why-trump-supports-diplomacy-north-korea-not-iran11776

This process should be given all the optimism we can muster for it is a good start but it must continue….

After that piece I read another interesting article…..why are pundits hating the Korean thing?

According to a recent poll, 88 percent of the South Korean public viewed the recent peace summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in as a success. In addition, 65 percent of South Koreans trust Kim Jong-un on his pledge to denuclearize, and Moon Jae-in’s approval ratings have shot up to 86 percent. Broadly speaking, recent developments between North and South Korea have been met with widespread optimism and praise from the South Korean public.

“’Yada, yada, yada,’ the perennial hawk Max Boot wrote disparagingly in the Washington Post about the ‘Korea summit hype,’ adding that ‘there is very little of substance here.’ Similar hot takes were offered by Nicholas Kristof and Nicholas Eberstadt in the New York Times, Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post, Robin Wright in the New Yorker, and Michael O’Hanlon in The Hill. Their doubts were repeated and amplified as gospel by the usual critics on cable TV.

http://theantimedia.com/pundits-horrified-korea-peace/

Keep an eye on FOX if they go against this thing so will Trump…..

NOTE:  I will be AFK (Away From Keyboard) this morning….my doctors want to have a go with me again….I will return as soon as possible….please enjoy your day and your readings….chuq

The Joint Korean Declaration

Last week the two leaders of the Korean Peninsula met at the DMZ and the world was hopeful……the chance are that their negotiations could bring an end to many decades of animosities toward each other.

Below is the link to the text of the declaration which I offer for people to see that these are great proposals……the problem is it is short on  specifics.  If this turns out to be a good thing and peace is found it will not be this year or even next…..

The following is an unofficial translation of the full text of a joint declaration signed and issued by South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un at the end of their bilateral summit held Friday at the Joint Security Area of Panmunjom inside the heavily-fortified Demilitarized Zone that divides the two Koreas.

http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/news/2018/04/27/0200000000AEN20180427013900315.html

Please do not start handing out the Nobel before there is a reason to award the prize……the situation is promising but not permanent…..keep in mind nothing about this is new……in the past proposals similar to these have been made and never come about…..

Possibly good things could happen but do not bet the house on it…..going “all in” would be a mistake at this point.

Hands Across The DMZ

We have the possibility for a Nobel Prize in the making here….North and South Korea met at the DMZ and history was made……

With a single step over a weathered, cracked slab of concrete, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un made history Friday by crossing over the world’s most heavily armed border to greet his rival, South Korean President Moon Jae-in, for talks on North Korea’s nuclear weapons. Kim then invited Moon to cross briefly north with him before they returned to the southern side. Moon grasped Kim’s hand and led him along a blindingly red carpet into South Korean territory, where school children placed flowers around their necks and an honor guard stood at attention for inspection, per the AP. Beyond the surface, however, it’s still not clear whether the leaders can make any progress in closed-door talks on the nuclear issue, which has bedeviled US and South Korean officials for decades.

Kim’s news agency said that the leader would “open-heartedly” discuss with Moon “all the issues arising in improving inter-Korean relations and achieving peace, prosperity, and reunification of the Korean peninsula” in a “historic” summit. It’s the first time one of the ruling Kim leaders has crossed over to the southern side of the Demilitarized Zone since the Korean War ended (though not officially) in 1953. Nuclear weapons will top the agenda, and Friday’s summit will be the clearest sign yet of whether it’s possible to peacefully negotiate those weapons away from a country that has spent decades doggedly building its bombs despite crippling sanctions and near-constant international opprobrium.

After all the tough talk about nukes a proposal has bee-n made about those nukes…..

The leaders also pledged to work for “complete denuclearization” of the Korean Peninsula and to reunify families divided by the war. “I hope this will be an opportunity for the two Korean peoples to move freely from North to South,” Kim said. “We need to take responsibility for our own history.”

The leaders pledged to make the DMZ a “peace zone” and to cease the broadcasting of propaganda across the zone by May 1. Military talks will be held next month to discuss reducing tensions, reports the AP, which notes that the declaration did not outline any concrete steps toward denuclearization. A South Korean official tells Reuters that Kim jokingly apologized to Moon for waking him up with missile tests and issued an invitation to visit Pyongyang later this year, which the South Korean leader accepted. In a tweet early Friday, President Trump, who is expected to meet Kim by early June, praised the “historic meeting,” adding: “Good things are happening, but only time will tell!”

Amazing turn of events and I am waiting for the Trump mind to start taking credit for all this….so far the Twitter thumbs have not been active on this event….but it is early….if anyone could piss up this it would be Trump.

Hands Across The DMZ

While you were making sleep and dreams……Hell began to freeze (a bit)……..

After all the big talk….after all the threats….after all the macho posturing it appears as if the US/South Korea/North Korea nuke situation may have been tamped down  bit.

Li’L Kim has offered to talk…..Trump has accepted (at least for now) and South Korea can change their drawers now……

In a startling development, North Korea says it will halt its nuclear weapons program and Kim Jong Un will meet with President Trump in the coming months, the Washington Post reports. “[Kim] expressed his eagerness to meet President Trump as soon as possible,” Chung Eui-yong told reporters Thursday at the White House. “President Trump said he would meet Kim Jong Un by May.” The South Korean national security adviser was part of a delegation that arrived at the White House on Thursday to deliver a letter from Kim directly to Trump, according to CNN. Chung had led a delegation that met with Kim in Pyongyang on Tuesday, the Los Angeles Times reports. That meeting left South Korea feeling hopeful about a diplomatic solution to the ongoing nuclear crisis with North Korea.

There’s no information about where the meeting between Trump and Kim will take place, but it will be the first face-to-face meeting between a sitting US president and the leader of North Korea. In fact, no sitting president has even held a phone call with with the North Korean leader. Chung gave Trump credit for the breakthrough. “I explained to President Trump that his leadership and his maximum pressure strategy … brought us to this juncture,” Chung said. But analysts are split on whether Kim is agreeing to halt his nuclear program and meet with Trump because sanctions are working and he fears a US attack or because he now sees the countries as equal nuclear powers. Kim will meet with South Korean President Moon Jae-in next month—only the third-ever meeting between the leaders of North and South Korea since 1953.

This is a great opportunity to solve a nagging problem of nukes on the Korean Peninsula….my worry is that there are not enough actual experts on the situation for any successful outcome.

However, this is a great chance for a peaceful conclusion to a tense situation…..then why do I have this uneasy feeling that it will go to crap before the meeting takes place?

There is not much time before the proposed meeting and with experienced diplomats many thing could go wrong….like…..

No location set. No location for the meeting has been set, though Mar-a-Lago is probably a long shot, the Guardian reports. Experts say that while there is a chance Kim could visit Washington or Trump could visit Pyongyang, more neutral potential venues include China, South Korea, or the DMZ.

A “real challenge” for diplomats. Analysts say it is going to be tough for the State Department to assemble a team that can support the historic summit. “The State Department has hemorrhaged Korean linguists and former negotiators” and North Korea “will send people with 30 years of experience, Douglas H. Paal at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace tells the Washington Post. “This is a real challenge.”

Trump optimism. Trump sounded optimistic about the meeting Thursday night. “Kim Jong Un talked about denuclearization with the South Korean Representatives, not just a freeze,” he tweeted. “Also, no missile testing by North Korea during this period of time. Great progress being made but sanctions will remain until an agreement is reached. Meeting being planned!”

Talks, not negotiations. A senior administration official tells the Los Angeles Times that at this point, “we’re not really talking about negotiations.” Trump “has been very clear from the beginning that he is not prepared to reward North Korea in exchange for talks,” the official says. “But he is willing to accept an invitation at this time to meet and to allow—and really expects—North Korea to put action to these words that were conveyed via the South Koreans.”

Is Trump being played? Analysts say the summit is a massive gamble—one that risks legitimizing one of the world’s worst human rights abusers. “We got nothing for it. And Kim will never give up his nukes,” Obama administration Asia adviser Evan S. Medeiros tells the New York Times. “Kim played Moon and is now playing Trump.”

Like I said…..so many things can go wrong…..

I wish I could be more optimistic….but after 12 months of the Reality Show in the White House I sadly cannot be so…..this is just a show for both sides.

And this is how you get “Stormy” off the front pages.