The July 16 summit in Helsinki between Presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin presents a unique opportunity to reverse the dangerous nuclear competition between the United States and Russia and should be welcomed, despite its inherent risks. The opportunity to stabilize U.S.-Russian nuclear relations by extending New START, a key nuclear treaty that is set to expire in 2021, is paramount and worth the issues that come with any meeting between Trump and Putin.

America’s top priority must be to avoid a second Korean war. Yet such a war is closer than ever and appears almost inevitable unless America changes the approach President Trump has been using since he took office. The greatest risk of war with North Korea is not sudden action by Kim Jong Un, but Kim responding to a perceived attack by Trump. North Korea foreign minister Ri Yong-ho drove that home Monday when he called Trump’s threats against his country “a clear declaration of war.”

The United States has been in a technical state of war with North Korea since the end of the Korean War in 1953. Every president since Dwight D. Eisenhower has had to navigate the risk of conflict with North Korea. What’s new is Trump’s bombastic approach to this long-standing challenge — his personal insults, crazy tweets and threat at the United Nations to "totally destroy North Korea."

Most Americans think North Korea is a crazy place, led by a crazy man bent on global destruction. This view, of course, is almost completely wrong and explains in part why the current public discussion about what to do with a nuclear North Korea is so unsatisfying. Far from crazy, Kim Jong Un has been methodical and careful enough in advancing his nuclear and missile programs to suggest that he is deterred by America’s overwhelming military capabilities, and at the very least is not eager to spark a military conflict—at least not yet.

On Friday, North Korea tested a missile than can deliver a nuclear weapon to almost any target in the continental United States, marking a major accomplishment for a state than many thought was on its last legs in the early 1990s. But far from dead, North Korea has managed to evade every political, military, and economic barrier that five successive U.S. presidents put in its way. Now, the United States under President Donald Trump has a massive but surmountable challenge on its hands—deterring a nuclear-armed North Korea and preserving and strengthening America’s alliances with South Korea and Japan, countries currently questioning whether Kim Jong Un’s new capabilities might prevent the United States from coming to their defense.

The Department of Defense has begun drafting the Trump administration’s Nuclear Posture Review (NPR). Conducted by each American president since 1994, the NPR is an official document that guides American nuclear policy and management of the U.S. nuclear arsenal. Past presidents have used NPRs to determine and explain publicly how many and what kinds of nuclear weapons the United States needs, and when they might be used. It is the script officials throughout the government can use to deter adversaries and reassure allies. As President Donald Trump continues to sow doubt among U.S. allies about his administration’s dedication to their defense, advocates for new, smaller, more usable nuclear weapons will offer their ideas as a way to counteract this growing confidence gap. Yet not all problems have a nuclear solution, and there is no combination of nuclear policy, weapons, and statements that can undo the damage Trump is doing to both our allies and the global nonproliferation system.

Long time reader, first time Wonker.  My thanks to the Wonk-Supreme for allowing me to contribute.

The president of the negotiations for a nuclear weapons ban convention has just released her first draft of the proposed treaty. As will become readily apparent, I am not an expert on international law, but I am a keenly-interested observer of the effort to negotiate a ban on nuclear weapons. I am also an admitted ban skeptic, not because I want to keep nuclear weapons but because I have am concerned the ban diverts scarce resources and attention from readily-identified blockages to nuclear reduction and elimination. 

President Donald Trump has identified North Korea as an urgent threat from whom nobody is safe, but efforts to maximize pressure and convince Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear weapons program have always been a long shot. The only chance of ending North Korea’s nuclear obsession is for the United States, South Korea, Japan, and China to collectively put enough pressure on Pyongyang to convince Kim Jong Un that a deal has to be made. Once North Korea comes to the table, all four states then have to be ready to take yes for an answer, offering a combination of security and economic incentives to make denuclearization a reasonable alternative for North Korea’s leader.

“The Trump administration is currently conducting across the entire government a review of our Iran policy,” U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson announced on April 19, adding that “an unchecked Iran has the potential to follow the same path as North Korea and take the world along with it.” Ironically, the Trump administration appears to be following the same path on Iran as George W. Bush did on North Korea. The result could be equally dangerous.

By undermining implementation of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA — a viable, verified, and sound agreement that blocks Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons — President Trump risks removing the shackles from Tehran’s nuclear efforts. We’ve been down that road before; instead of preserving and strengthening the Agreed Framework with North Korea, Bush freed Pyongyang to keep working on nuclear weapons that could eventually reach American territory.

North Korea has been the focus of global attention and anxiety over the past few weeks. The country’s nuclear and missile capabilities, and increasingly strong statements from U.S. officials, including President Donald Trump, have raised global concerns about the possibility of open war on the Korea Peninsula. While people are right to be worried, the seeds of a diplomatic solution could be forming — if the Trump administration is thoughtful and disciplined enough to seize the opportunity, and if the White House’s bluster is in fact calculated. Big ifs, to be sure, but the threat of military force may motivate both China and North Korea to consider deals in a way they have not been willing to up until now.