Even by Donald Trump’s undiplomatic standards, his speech at the UN general assembly was remarkably reckless. To gasps from his audience, Trump vowed to “totally destroy” North Korea if it persisted with its threats and branded Kim Jong-un “rocket man”. In an apparent resurrection of George W Bush’s “axis of evil”, the US president also declared: “If the righteous many do not confront the wicked few, then evil will triumph”.
For North Korea, Trump’s words merely provide further justification for its nuclear weapons programme. Though the regime is typically depicted as crazed (and in some respects it is), its nuclear project rests on rational foundations. For Kim, the lesson from the fall of Saddam Hussein and Muammar Gaddafi was that tyrants pay a price for relinquishing their arms. The persistent threats from the US strengthen the regime’s domestic position and reinforce a siege mentality. Though North Korea must be deterred from a pre-emptive strike, it must also be offered incentives to pursue a different path.
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