Will North Korea Ever be Denuked?

Cole Belling, Reporter

North Korea acts like it is trapped in an ice cube when dealing with other nations, but is this ice cube thawing? North Korea recently opened up to negotiations with the United States and South Korea. Unfortunately not everyone agrees on a way to defuse this tense situation.

In June we supposedly came one step closer to denuclearization when President Donald Trump met with Kim Jong Un, the dictator of North Korea, for a conference in Singapore about the current situation. After a few hours they emerged announcing that they had reached an agreement. They both sang praise for each other and about how well the conversation went, but amusingly would not share many details about the deal. Trump returned to the US bragging about himself in speeches and tweets talking about how he had denuked Kim’s Arsenal.

So far, however, North Korea has not appeared to dismantle its nuclear arms system. Will it ever?

More recently Kim Jong Un has declared, “Unwavering faith in President Trump.” Many media reports call the North’s Arsenal ineffective and outdated. Is this really true? On July 4, 2017 North Korea test fired the Hwasong-14, its first ICBM (Intercontinental Ballistic Missile) which had an estimated range of 10,000km. This makes it capable of reaching most of the US mainland.

Hopefully an ICBM will never be launched at any other nation from North Korea. This could result in a counterattack from the U.S. – sparking World War III. To avoid that awful possibility, what does President Trump need to do now in this terrifying nuclear chess match? Does he take down another pawn, or does he go for the checkmate?