Joe Biden wanted to calm down. Interviewed shortly before his departure for Japan, the US President said he was “prepared” for a possible nuclear test by North Korea on Sunday in Seoul and reiterated his willingness to engage in dialogue with a unique message to Kim Jong-un.
“We are prepared for anything North Korea can do,” he said, saying he was “not concerned” about a possible nuclear test. When asked by a journalist if he had a message for North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, the president laconically replied: “Hello. Period “.
Deadlocked Conversations
A way to get word that Washington remains open to dialogue with North Korea, even if there is no reciprocity. Talks with Pyongyang have stalled since a failed summit in 2019 between Mr Kim and then-US President Donald Trump.
Mr. Biden left South Korea early Sunday afternoon for Japan, another major United States ally in the region and the second leg of his first trip to Asia as president.
In Seoul, he met his counterpart Yoon Suk-yeol, a pro-US conservative who came to power in early May. The two heads of state spoke of intensifying their joint military exercises in order to counter Kim Jong-un’s “saber sounds”.
Defense against a “nuclear attack”
Yoon Suk-yeol also mentioned the use of “strategic means” by the United States in his country to counter “a nuclear attack.” Those means should “include warplanes and missiles, unlike before when we only thought about the nuclear deterrent umbrella,” he said.
Any use of such weapons or any intensification of joint military exercises risks angering Pyongyang, which sees these maneuvers as a dress rehearsal for an invasion.
South Korean intelligence has warned that North Korea has completed preparations to conduct a nuclear test that would be the seventh in its history and the first in five years. It is possible that this test will take place before the end of the US President’s visit to Asia.
Adding to the uncertainties, North Korea, whose population is not vaccinated against Covid-19, is currently facing an outbreak of the epidemic, with nearly 2.6 million cases and 67 deaths, according to the latest official figures.
democracies and autocracies
As a sign of America’s ambitions in the region, during a joint press briefing with Mr Yoon, Mr Biden referred to a “global competition between democracies and autocracies,” stating that the Asia-Pacific region is a key battleground.
“We have spoken at length about the need to ensure that (this cooperation) is not limited to the United States, Japan and Korea, but that it spans the entire Pacific, South Pacific and Indo-Pacific. I think (this trip) is an opportunity,” said Joe Biden. China is the United States’ main competitor in this geopolitical struggle.
Before leaving Seoul, the US President met with the head of automaker Hyundai to celebrate the giant’s decision to invest $5.5 billion in an electric vehicle factory in Georgia, in the southern United States. He also visited American and South Korean soldiers with Mr. Yoon, a sign of the “truly integrated nature” of the two countries’ economic and military alliance, according to a senior White House official.
In Japan, he will meet Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Emperor Naruhito on Monday ahead of Tuesday’s quad meeting, a diplomatic format he hopes to revive that will bring the United States, Japan, India and the United States together.