00:00Kim Jong-un stated that North Korea is willing to have peaceful relations with the U.S.,
00:05but only if Washington accepts the permanence of their nuclear arsenal.
00:11And, Derek, do you think Trump will have any interest in talks?
00:15Remember, the two men did meet in Hanoi back in Donald Trump's first term.
00:20Or do you think he just won't be interested because now it seems like the rules of the negotiation terms
00:27have been changed?
00:30I do think Trump's interested in reengaging.
00:33If you notice during the State of the Union address, he mentioned Iran, he mentioned Venezuela.
00:38He didn't mention North Korea.
00:40And, in fact, the national security strategy and the national defense strategy are very light on North Korea,
00:47if they even mention North Korea by name at all.
00:49And so I think this is very much about optics, keeping a positive environment,
00:54which is in line with what Kim Jong-un wants.
00:56Also, Trump views other leaders in very personal terms.
01:03And, of course, he has referred to Kim Jong-un as not just Rocket Man, but Little Rocket Man,
01:09which he thought was actually a compliment and apparently Kim didn't really appreciate.
01:13OK, but nonetheless, he also said that Trump and Kim wrote each other love letters and fell in love.
01:20OK, so this is a relationship that I think Trump does not want to see die on the vine.
01:26And you mentioned that they met in Hanoi in February of 2019.
01:29But also, Trump became the first sitting president to step foot into North Korea and meet with the North Korean
01:36leaders.
01:36So there's a lot of personal baggage here, I think, in a good way.
01:42But the problem for Trump is that Kim is now much more strongly aligned with China and Russia.
01:49And so there's going to be, I think, less appetite from Kim to negotiate with Trump.
01:54He's really going to look for sanctions relief first before they talk about Kim Jong-un's nuclear program at all.
02:01And so, you know, we're going to look for sanctions relief first before they talk about Kim Jong-un.
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