The "love affair" president Donald Trump said he has with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un might be over in two weeks.
On December 5, KCNA, North Korea's state-run news agency, again threatened Trump if he didn't come to the negotiating table with major concessions like sanctions relief in exchange for North Korea's a voluntary moratorium on missile testing. North Korea then threatened Trump will receive a "Christmas gift," which experts believe might indicate a resumption of tests of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of delivering a nuclear warhead to targets in the Continental United States. Trump hasn't condemned a single North Korean missile test over the past year saying none of these were ICBMs.
It remains to be seen if Trump will condemn a North Korea ICBM test even if it means the ultimate defeat of his plan to take sole credit for denuclearizing North Korea -- and perhaps winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Some analysts are betting Trump won't criticize North Korea for its upcoming ICBM test.
Kim temporarily halted ICBM and nuclear weapons tests in 2018 ahead of his first failed summit with Trump in Singapore. A second summit with Trump in Hanoi last February also failed after Trump demanded Kim immediately denuclearize. Both failures later say Pyongyang threatening to embark on a "new path" if the U.S. maintains its North Korean sanctions.
Kim's more bellicose public pronouncements have convinced both the United States Armed Forces and the U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) over the weekend to predict an imminent test by North Korea of an ICBM.
U.S. military analysts concur Trump has no options to prevent an ICBM test, having no leverage whatsoever over Kim except for suspending sanctions. They said North Korea testing an ICBM a major political defeat for Trump and his amateurish efforts to put a stop to North Korea's development of nuclear weapons and ICBMs to carry them to their targets. Trump has always bragged denuclearizing North Korea is his top foreign policy initiative.
Top U.S. military officers revealed there are no plans to destroy this missile on its launchpad inside North Korea (which will be an act of war) or intercept it in the atmosphere (which is all but impossible).
Bereft of any face-saving options, Trump will likely pressure the United Nations Security Council for more sanctions against North Korea in the event of an ICBM test. Analysts noted this strategy over the past two decades has failed to stop the advance of North Korea's nuclear weapons development and ICBM programs.
In its latest threat, North Korea said the U.S. will "pay dearly" after it sponsored a U.N. resolution condemning its "long-standing and ongoing" violations of human rights.
