No agreement was reached on North Korea’s nuclear weapons during a highly touted summit between Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. The two men met for two days in Hanoi, Vietnam but left empty-handed. “Sometimes you gotta walkaway,” Trump told the press shortly before heading back to Washington, DC.
So now that this meeting has ended in failure what comes next for nuclear diplomacy with North Korea?
On the line with me to discuss the events in Hanoi and talk through possible scenarios for future engagement with North Korea is Kelsey Davenport, the director of non-proliferation policy at the Arms Control Association.
We kick off discussing why this summit ended without any agreement. We also go over the events leading up to this Hanoi meeting, including the first summit between these two men in Singapore eight months ago. We then have a longer conversation about what the next iteration of diplomacy between the United States and North Korea may look like.
This conversation does a good job both explaining what happened in Hanoi and setting the context for understanding what may come next between the United States and North Korea. If you have twenty minutes and want to understand where things now stand between the United States and North Korea–and how high stakes nuclear diplomacy may evolve over the coming weeks and months, have a listen.