My live TV interview on RT of 4 September, 2017, argues that the new game-changing reality demands a "grand bargain". I pursued the same line of thought in my TV interviews the day before.
My thinking very much tallies with what was suggested by Asia Society policy Institute President Kevin Rudd in his address to the Swedish Institute of International Affairs on 31st August. Rudd's "grand bargain" involves the U.S accepting -
"1. A formal peace treaty following the armistice which has been in operation since 1953;
2. Formal diplomatic recognition of Pyongyang by the United States;
3. External security guarantees for the future of the regime and the North Korean state, provided by the Chinese, the Americans and possibly the Russians;
4. For the Chinese then to be able to assist North Korea to continue to reform and develop the North Korean economy;
5. And possibly, and most problematically, a staged program for the eventual withdrawal step-by-step of U.S. forces from South Korea".
......., a possible stepping stone to this could be a variation of the mutual freeze option currently mooted by China: a freeze in U.S.-South Korean military exercises, in exchange for a freeze on North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile testing programs".
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