North Korea and the Cuban missile crisis

There is no direct comparison between the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 and the North Korea nuclear crisis of 2017. Yet there are some similarities and perhaps some reasons to hope for the best, based on what happened 55 years ago. Krushchev was prepared to go to the brink of nuclear Armageddon but just when the world thought this was it, a nuclear holocaust, the Soviet leader backed down. His ships carrying missiles and other equipment to Cuba sailed close to the US naval blockade off the island and then turned around. The crisis was over. But there had to be a deal first. In exchange for removing the missiles from the sites in Cuba, Krushchev was told the US would remove its nuclear ballistic missiles from Turkey. John F Kennedy won the "blink" contest but Krushchev did not go away empty-handed. What could Kim Jong-un get by way of a deal with Washington? The trouble is his ballistic missiles and their nuclear warheads are located on North Korean territory, so there is no comparison here with the Cuban situation. But could the US suggest that if Kim keeps all his current stock of missiles and nuclear warheads in storage and stops developing any more, then negotiations could begin to transform North Korea's economy, trade and standard of living for its desperately poor people. In other words, accept that North Korea is an effective nuclear power but in mothballs, not threatening anyone. It would go against everything Trump, and Obama before him, said about North Korea never being allowed to become a nuclear power, but the reality is, Pyongyang has built missiles that have a range of 6,500 miles with a capability to carry nuclear warheads. That puts western and central parts of America in the target area. But to be brutally frank, the whole of the United States is already in the line of fire of ballistic missiles held by Russia and China. So it's not a unique scenario. Of course, no one expects Russia or China to launch nuclear missiles at America. Not now anyway. And North Korea just might. So again the situation is different. But ultimately Washington and the rest of the world are going to have to come to terms with a nuclear North Korea, and find someway of coping with that. As I wrote in a blog yesterday, someone very senior from the US needs to take a delegation to Pyongyang, preferably with some high-ranking Chinese officials in tow, to deal with Kim direct.