Why Trump Can't Run the North Korea Summit Like a Real-Estate Deal
Business transactions are fungible. Negotiations to stop rogue states from getting nuclear weapons are not.
It’s often hard for outside analysts to determine what’s driving North Korea’s tactical decisions, but it’s fun to imagine that someone in Pyongyang has been reading The Art of the Deal ahead of a planned summit with the U.S. in Singapore. (Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has been digging into Michael Wolff’s Fire and Fury, if his Instagram feed is to be believed.) That would explain North Korea’s move earlier this week when it threatened to pull out of the June meeting if the U.S. insists on full denuclearization: “Know when to walk away from the table” is one of Trump’s rules from his 1987 bestseller.
Trump has
