Pompeo Discloses Little

“The mission is to make sure that we understand what each side is truly trying to achieve,” Pompeo said Friday en route to Japan, his first stop on his swing through East Asia.

https://abcnews.go.com/International/mike-pompeo-heads-north-korea-low-expectations-high/story?id=58310367

South Korea SBS News reported today that the Blue House was noticeably cautious this morning after Pompeo's formulaic statements in Japan. He still appears to be seeking a global settlement (FFIV) of the North Korean nuclear weapons program, holding out a "peace treaty" and proposed Chinese participation in "peace treaty" negotiations. His statements appear to reflect a level of immobility that often is a part of US negotiations.

Bruce Klinger and Victor Cha are experts who have played a role in getting the US and Northeast Asia into this situation. The idea that the problem can be resolved in the way they suggest, in the abc.com article, reflects an absolute indifference to the major parties on the other side of the table. Klinger says the South Koreans are too eager. Apparently, seventy years isn't long enough to wait to get your country back from the dictates of foreigners. (He's also referred to Koreans as "lemmings," in the past.) With respect to Cha, I suspect that his conventional approach to this situation, which includes the meta-inventory and inspection regime upfront, is exactly Pompeo's, in spite of admonitions that it is better to be "reasonable" as South Korea's Foreign Minister Kang Kyung Hwa's has said. That is take the substantial concessions currently being offered by North Korea, and give some reciprocal concessions, as part of a process on the way to building further trust and more comprehensive accomplishments in the future.

Update 10/8 00:30

The prospects for progress in the negotiations between the US and North Korea, are regarded as promising in South Korea after the Pompeo visit to Pyongyang. Detailed discussions of potential agreement on both sides are not uncommon in South Korean media while typically being dismissed preemptively in the US media. South Korean analysts have variously described US media, "establishment elites" and "conservatives" as presenting a headwind or backlash to administration negotiation efforts. They leave out the democratic opposition which has also been harshly critical of the summit process and it's aftermath. Apparently, offered currently by the North are the inspection of the Pungaeri nuclear test site destroyed earlier, dismantlement and inspection of the Sohae missile launch facility, and dismantlement and inspection of the Yongbyun Nuclear research facility, if the right reciprocal measures are forthcoming by the US. Some of the analysts envisioned the possibility of a Trump - Kim summit before Nov. 6.