Trump sees sense

There are some things which Trump realises can't or shouldn't be done. A visit to the Demilitarised Zone at Panmunjon on the border of North and South Korea was one of those "don't do's". I wrote about this recently and suggested the presence of Trump in the DMZ would have potentially dangerous consequences. But I bet the conversations he had with John Kelly, his chief of staff, and other military types, were lively. Trump would surely have said: "If I don't go, like other presidents have done, Kim Jong-whatsit will think I'm backing down, that I'm weak when I am actually the most powerful man in the whole world." General Kelly would have soothed and smoothed, pointing out that of all recent presidents he was the one most feared by Kim Jong-whatsit and so he didn't need to go to Panmunjon to peer through binoculars, like his predecessors had done. Be different, General Kelly would have said. Trump would have liked that sort of comment - that's what Kelly is paid for - but instinctively he would have loved to go to the DMZ and look, well, pretty tough and omniscient. But diplomacy has won through, and the White House came out with the statement that the president had such a busy schedule he couldn't fit in the time to go to the DMZ. So that's that. Meanwhile Kim has gone all quiet, visiting cosmetic factories, and then there's the extremely suspect story about how 200 people died when the last nuclear test was carried out, with the mountain above the underground test site rocking and wavering. If that's true, then Kim has to start looking for another mountain. But the story, true or false, will give a little breathing space while Trump rushes in and out of South Korea without so much as a glance over the border into Kim Jong-whatsit territory. Nevertheless I'm sure Trump's speeches in the area will include lots of references about how the military option remains on the table. One presumes the table in this case is the presidential Resolute Desk in the Oval Office that was a gift from Queen Victoria in 1888 and was built from the oak timbers of the British Arctic exploration ship, Resolute. The desk no doubt will help Trump to remain resolute in dealing with Kim Jong-whatsit.