Is Trump choosing North Korea over South Korea? | About That

liability.Why else would he post this week about his very good relationship with North Korea, while saying he's not happy with joint military exercises with South Korea.He calls them costly and totally inappropriate and hostile to the North, which he sees as unthreatening.And I recently asked the president of South Korea if they would like to join us in the denuclearization of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and they said no thanks.They didn't help us.So why should we help them?

U .S.President Donald Trump is ordering the Pentagon to significantly scale back joint military of East Asian security.

And it's about asking the question, if nuclear armed North Korea is becoming stronger, why would the U .S.make its military presence in South Korea weaker?Joint military exercises are all about practice and planning, preparing for the worst.If North Korea were to invade, how quickly could U .S.

and South Korean forces share intelligence to predict enemy movements, coordinate logistics to keep friendly forces in action?So there are live fire exercises to test joint precision targeting of incoming vessels or incoming rockets.As in years past, they'll practice what are called wet gap crossings, which is solving the problem of how you keep your forces moving forward if there's nothing but water in the way, say a road or a bridge has been knocked out.But the war games that just began are also a little different from years past, because they're meant to account for the very real chance that the enemy has evolved.For the better part of a year now, North Korean soldiers have gotten real battlefield experience helping fight Russia's war in Ukraine.

South Korea and Western militaries estimate more than 10 ,000 North Korean troops helped Russian forces recapturethe Kursk region.

They're on the front lines and fighting in a way they're not used to.This is a war defined by killer drones, cyber attacks, GPS disruption, which forces North Korea to adapt.to level up.

North Korea has now had or it allows them to see what modern warfare is like.

So in South Korea, this year's joint military exercises with the US were meant to simulate and counter that.

This is now a very dynamic relationship of, you know, trying to, um, it's on both sides for further arms racing.

And North Korea isn't just gaining experience sales, and there are other ways the two sides have built on this mutually beneficial partnership.Beer and tobacco, even with Russia increasing exports of many staples to North Korea, there's intelligence sharing as well.and whether or not Russia is sharing satellite technology itself.Significant material and technological assistance from Russia.

The North Korean economy has essentially flourished compared to where it was before because North Korea is no longer isolated.

And as of June last year, as part of the two countries' strategic partnership pact, this mutually beneficial partnership also contains a mutual defense clause.

It's a Cold War type arrangement, a mutual defense arrangement.

North Korea, though, gains not only the current backing of Russia, but also sort of a voucher in the future that it could redeem with Russia in the event of there being a sort of a more aggressive campaign against North Korea or a military contingency in the future.With regards to Russia's support of North Korea, North Korea has never been more dangerous and more capable.

And keep in mind, all of this is on top of the years North Korea has spent improving its existingweapons capability.It routinely carries out tests of its ballistic missiles, banned by the United Nations, and North Korea is still estimated to maintain at least dozens, maybe up to 60, of those.nuclear warheads with enough fissile materials more than double that, which is to say, not simply for the US and South Korea to affirm a commitment to each other, but to demonstrate and test the effectiveness of it.The notion that the US, on Trump's whim, has suddenly decided to scale back the exercises substantially.

the interoperability, the ability of the two nations' militaries to create contingency.

So the question then is why?Why scale back U .S.support when the North Korean threat is arguably at its greatest?It's tempting to see all of this as yet another example of Trump seeing allies as opportunities.After all, America first has meant squeezing their economies by way of tariffs, attacking their sense of security by applying pressure through NATO, even threatening their sovereignty, as anyone living in Canada or Greenland will recognize.

But the truth of the matter is scaling back military exercises is part of a slightly different different playbook we've seen before.

The president revealed today a military concession that the U .S.will halt joint military exercises with South Korea.

I think it's inappropriate to be having war games.2018 was during Trump's first term where he seemed willing to strain his relationship with South Korea in a bid to get North Korea on side.The cancellation of joint military exercises with South Korea then was part of a courtship that led to theone, not two, but three face -to -face events has set foot in North Korea.The goal, of course, then was to begin stripping away at North Korea's nukes, negotiate some sort of deal on friendly terms to denuclearize.

Because effectively, the U .S.wasn't willing to accept North Korea's pledges.

Just a day before joint military exercises with South Korea were slated to begin, Trump's particular picture, there are many where we're smiling.Kim Jong -un and I get along great.President Donald J. Trump.Then came the announcement that military exercises with South Korea would be scaled back.And now we wait.

Some of the messaging towards North Korea, you know, really reflects I think what we've seen Trump talk about in the past of trying to revive diplomacy with North Korea.

To state the obvious, I don't think anybody's assets, soldiers, they're still all in place.But the way in which Trump plays into a zombie, relations slowly withering under U .S.leadership that is increasingly seen to be unreliable as a partner.

Just one announcement or one reduction of a military exercise by itself is not enough to undermine the alliance, because the alliance is strong.But it's a number of actions, including on the trade side, including other statements of President Trump being self -reliant to have much more independence.

And while South Korea would much prefer to be able to count on the U .S.as protector and guardian, it now has to confront a future where it may not better arm and protect itself.