How Trump solved the North Korea crisis by not solving it

No other president would have declared victory after such meaningless concessions from Kim. No other president would have met with Kim in the first place. But on the other hand, it’s unlikely that any other president would have had any better luck in inducing Kim to give up his weapons without launching a war that could have killed millions. (A President Lindsey Graham would have been just fine with the latter scenario, Bob Woodward’s reporting suggests.)

Nuclear weapons technology is older than color television, and at this point, any country that really wants nukes and is willing to endure the resulting sanctions and international opprobrium probably can develop them. North Korea wants the status that countries like Israel, Pakistan, and India have attained, possessing arsenals that are in violation of international norms but generally treated as facts of life that no one can do much about. Trump’s remarkable feat, intentional or not, has been in getting the U.S. public to accept North Korea as a de facto nuclear power.

For most of this past year, it seemed like this con would be unsustainable. Sooner or later, Trump would become so frustrated with the lack of progress toward denuclearization that the name-calling and threats would begin again, so the argument goes. But this may underestimate Trump’s ability to gaslight his supporters, his refusal to concede defeat, and everyone else’s disinterest in upsetting a relatively stable status quo.