Donald Trump releases video exposing Bill Clinton’s failure on North Korea

Donald Trump releases video exposing Bill Clinton’s failure on North Korea
December 30, 2017
https://www.conservativeinstitute.org/foreign-policy/north-korea/trump-video-clinton-failure.htm?utm_campaign=dynamic_campaign&utm_medium=automated&bt_alias=eyJ1c2VySWQiOiAiZWY0MGMwZDctYmU0Ni00YjlhLThhNGUtZWNlOTA1ODUyOTJjIn0%3D&utm_source=boomtrain
Donald Trump releases video exposing Bill Clinton’s failure on North Korea
Gage Skidmore / CCL; Gregory Reed / Shutterstock.com
The current standoff with North Korea, who experts believe now possesses the ability to strike the entirety of the continental U.S. with nuclear warheads, did not begin with the Trump administration. Yet, the president’s critics seem to forget the decades of failed diplomacy leading up to the current deadlock.
In response to complaints that his aggressive stance toward North Korea has somehow emboldened its hostile dictator, President Donald Trump recently posted a video reminding his detractors that problems with North Korean nuclear proliferation began under Bill Clinton’s failed diplomacy. Trump warned back in 1999 that the U.S. should prioritize ending North Korea’s nuclear program before it was too late.
Presidential prophesy
The video, posted to Twitter for the president’s 44 million followers to view, details just how long Trump has prioritized addressing North Korea’s aggressive nuclear proliferation. “I’ve been saying it for a long, long time,” Trump captioned the video.

Donald J. Trump

@realDonaldTrump
I've been saying it for a long, long time. #NoKo

7:20 PM - Dec 28, 2017
 11,194 11,194 Replies   25,975 25,975 Retweets   72,296 72,296 likes
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The video begins with Clinton’s announcement of the 1994 agreement with North Korea that was doomed to fail. The Democratic president promised that then-North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il would “freeze and then dismantle its nuclear program,” after praising the agreement as “a good deal for the United States.”

At the time, Clinton has just secured an arrangement with Pyongyang where North Korea would halt its nuclear development in exchange for a massive bribe. The Clinton administration promised to build two light-water nuclear reactors for North Korea and supply them with 500,000 tons of heavy fuel oil.

The nuclear pact drew fire from Republicans in Congress for rewarding aggressive behavior from a rogue regime, as well as underestimating the cost of the U.S. commitments and overestimating contributions from U.S. allies. Clinton ultimately failed to keep his promises to Kim Jong Il, and it wasn’t long before Pyongyang was firing up its nuclear reactors and testing its infant missile program once again.

“You want to do it in five years?”
Trump’s video then transitions to a clip of a 1999 exchange he shared with Tim Russert from Meet the Press. Trump argued that nuclear proliferation was the most important issue facing America at the time — more important than the economy or any other issue affecting American prosperity.

When the real estate mogul argued that the U.S. should take immediate military action against North Korea, Russert challenged Trump by insisting that certain generals were saying that a preemptive strike would be too costly.

Trump’s response to his skeptical host was prophetic:

You want to do it in five years when they have warheads pointed all over the place, every one of them pointed at New York City, to Washington? …. You better do it now.

Diplomatic dividends
Though Trump’s estimate was a few years off, his warning eventually came true when North Korea tested an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of reaching America’s eastern seaboard. The next portion of the president’s video illustrates that his predictions were correct, showing a news report which announced North Korea’s historic and frightening nuclear advancement coming to fruition.

The video concludes with an assessment from Secretary of Defense James Mattis, who called North Korea’s nuclear progress “a threat that endangers world peace, regional peace, and certainly the United States.”

The president’s severe language toward North Korea over the summer has not been designed to provoke them. Rather, he is simply exercising a diplomatic alternative that gives America leverage against the despotic regime.

This is a far cry from the failed “strategic patience” employed by past American presidents, and Trump’s tough talk has already produced dividends, compelling China and Russia to join the U.S. in imposing sanctions for fear that — for the first time — a U.S. president may actually mean what he says when he talks about using force.