RUTHFULLY YOURS

South Korean officials disclosed Tuesday that North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un says he’s ready to talk with the U.S. about giving up his nuclear weapons. That’s news because Kim has long said he’d never negotiate away his weapons. But the world has seen this diplomatic movie before, only to learn that the North was merely buying more time to build more bombs and ballistic missiles.

“I think that their statement, and the statements coming out of South Korea and North Korea have been very positive,” President Trump said Tuesday. “That would be a great thing for the world. A great thing for the world. So we’ll see how it all comes about.”

Realism is warranted. The hopeful case is that the North’s reversal is a response to the Trump Administration’s policy of pressure through tighter sanctions and diplomatic isolation. Building on United Nations sanctions, the Treasury Department has been blacklisting companies, most of them Chinese, for trading with the North.

As the Journal reported last week, trade across the border with China has declined sharply. Despite its official ideology of self-sufficiency, the North depends on imports of energy, food and raw materials to survive. It also needs luxury goods to reward top officials.

The Trump Administration’s threats of military action if sanctions don’t work may also have secured more Chinese cooperation, even if a military strike carries huge risks. Beijing has been forced to consider the possibility of conflict between nuclear states on its doorstep. It’s also notable that the North told South Korean officials that it agreed to the U.S. demand to halt nuclear and missile tests while talks are underway. Perhaps Mr. Trump’s tough line wasn’t as dangerous and destabilizing as his critics claimed.

Yet the U.S. and the world should still be skeptical that Kim will really put his nukes on the negotiating table. Kim’s father and grandfather used talks to stall for time while they continued the nuclear program in secret. They also extracted concessions in return for talking and broke every promise they made.

The new diplomacy offer also follows a familiar Pyongyang pattern. First make nuclear or missile advances that increase its threat to South Korea and the world. Then make a diplomatic bid once a dovish government takes over in Seoul. This time Kim took advantage of the recent Olympic games and the aching, almost palpable, desire of new South Korean President Moon Jae-in for talks.

The South Koreans said North also demanded “security guarantees,” which it may define as the departure of U.S. forces from Korean peninsula. That would be a security and geopolitical disaster as long as the North retains its military threat.

The primary goals of American foreign policy are to make our citizens, friends and allies secure and to make our adversaries think twice. There are moments in history when well-timed, well-placed military action will have the effect of causing fear — and moments that, if allowed to pass by, ensure the opposite. President Barack Obama’s failure to uphold the international conventions against chemical weapons worked against American interests in what is perhaps the ugliest battlefield of the 21st century. President Donald Trump’s decision to attack the Syria’s Al-Shayrat Military Airbase from which the Assad regime launched chemical attacks in 2017 was a welcome reversal, though with limited results.

The illegitimacy of chemical weapons use is one of the few points of international consensus in war fighting. The first treaty against it is more than 115 years old – the Hague Declaration of 1899, which was followed by the 1919 Treaty of Versailles and the 1925 Geneva Protocol.

But the Bashar Assad regime in Syria — with the active support of Russia — has again been using chlorine barrel bombs against the 400,000 hostage civilians of Ghouta. Having failed to pass a Security Council resolution to sanction Syria (Russia and China vetoed), the United Nations Security Council succeeded in passing a unanimous resolution calling for a humanitarian ceasefire. Less than 24 hours later, there were new reports of chemical raids killing hundreds.