He blinked!

Up until very recently, Donald Trump was prone to display himself using his angry rhetoric believing he could impose his will over everybody else just as he did when he was running his Trump empire like a businessman in full autocratic mode of management. Not anymore.

North Korea started off 2017 with Kim Jong Un, the sole ruler of North Korea, warning that his country was nearly ready to test-launch an intercontinental ballistic missile, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. Responding almost immediately to this defiant announcement, president elect Donald Trump tweeted January 2, 2017, at 4:05 PM:

“North Korea just stated that it is in the final stages of developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching parts of the U.S. It won't happen!”

It did not take long to receive a reply from the North Korean government, craftily scheduled a short time later after Donald Trump had become President of the United States of America. A launch did take place at 7:55 a.m. Sunday February 11, 2017 (Seoul time) toward the Sea of Japan just as Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was on an official visit to the United States to meet with Trump. “North Korea's most recent missile launch is absolutely intolerable”, Abe said at a joint appearance with Trump during the night of Saturday January 11th in Florida. Abe said Trump's presence at the joint appearance was a demonstration of support for Japan. Standing by his side, President Donald Trump vowed that the United States would support its ally Japan “100 percent” after North Korea launched its ballistic missile from the sea and onto the sea, in what appears to be its first missile test since Trump took office. The Trump statement regarding the North Korean missile launch goes as follows: “I just want everybody to understand and fully know that the United States of America stands behind Japan, its great ally, 100 percent”.

The missile was not an intercontinental ballistic missile, U.S. Strategic Command said. It said the missile is believed to have been a medium- or intermediate-range ballistic missile, and the launch posed no direct threat to the U.S. However, it was an act of defiance from the leader of North Korea intended to sour the meeting between the President of the USA and the Prime Minister of Japan, and also to set the tone for the response that would follow and the decision that President Donald Trump was expected to take in response to this missile launch.

Immediately after the launch of the North Korean missile,Trump acting as President of the most powerful nation on Earth could have sent the Seventh Fleet to surround North Korea from the East and from the West with the aircraft carriers coming very close to the North Korean shores, or he could have raised the level of alert to DEFCON 2 warning the North Korean military that his presidency had decided to go into such stage in response to the launching of the missile. Any of these actions would most certainly have raised alarm bells in Pyongyang. Instead, a trembling DonaldTrump added no more, leaving everybody guessing that perhaps he would end up merely considering economic sanctions -as usual- against North Korea, a recipe that has proven totally useless in the past against a very resilient North Korea. This besides hiding in a state dinner while hosting a foreign head of state in what could be called the ostrich response (strictly speaking, ostriches never really bury their heads in the sand when facing imminent danger, but the comparison still holds). So Kim Jung Un could have tweeted Trump (Kim Jong Un still does not have an official Twitter account, but in cases such as these it would come in handy): “Is that the best you've got? Was that all your sabre rattling? C'mon, you've gotta be kidding!”.

Nevertheless, considering the fierce rhetoric used by Donald Trump in his tweet of January 2, 2017 against North Korea when he was already president elect, and now being the President of the USA and Commander in Chief of the US Army, many among his most loyal followers fully expected that almost immediately after the North Korean missile launch President Trump would, at least for once, just once, set aside his tweeting addiction to address the entire USA through national TV with a message to the nation that could have gone along the following lines:

My fellow Americans. When I became elected by a clear majority, err... with a majority of votes in the Electoral College, after a threat was issued in the beginning of 2017 by the leader of North Korea warning that his country was nearly ready to test-launch an intercontinental ballistic missile, I clearly stated and promised you by means of my now famous tweet of January 2, 2017 that such a thing would not happen, and I used the words: “It won't happen!”. The leader of North Korea, Kim Jong Un, should have listened my own warning to his country.

As many of you may already know by now, just a few hours ago and despite all the caveats I have made to North Korea before and after becoming your President, in an act of provocation clearly taken to put to the test the American resolve North Korea launched what is believed to have been a medium- or intermediate-range ballistic missile. This will not happen again, and I will keep my solemn promise made to all of you that a test launch of a North Korea  intercontinental ballistic missile JUST WON'T HAPPEN! When I stated so, I was not kidding, I was not bluffing, and the leader of North Korea should have taken very seriously the message sent to him by the President of the United States of America. Therefore, I am going to back up my words with actions, by considering the provocation just made by North Korea as an ACT OF WAR, and as such we can consider ourselves in a state of war with the Republic of North Korea. To this effect, and as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of the United States of America, I have instructed both the US Air Force and the US Navy to launch a full scale attack to permanently cripple all the air and sea capabilities of the North Korean Army, and to put an end to the threat posed by such country against us. The leadership of North Korea will be removed from power once and for all, and all those who committed crimes against humanity will be brought to justice. I Donald Trump place full responsibility of all the casualties that will result from my orders as Commander in Chief upon the shoulders of the North Korean regime, and I will make it impossible for North Korea once it has been erased from the map as a military threat to attempt to launch any kind of missile or attempt to launch any kind of attack against America and any of its allies. And I will thus be keeping my promise made to all of you, expressed as a solemn oath from now on, that regarding a missile launch of a North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile will just not happen because that threat will be removed as of today, once and for all. God be with us.

And then all Hell would brake loose, and that would be it! The Generals of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, obeying orders, would perhaps be more than happy to comply and carry out the wishes of President Trump in setting off World War Three, as long as he gives them enough time to pack up their bags and take a one-way trip with their families to some far away corner of the Earth such as Antarctica.

But just like in the staring game with two opponents staring at one another, where the loser in the staring game is the one who loses first, Donald Trump as Commander in Chief of the US Army did not take any sort of action which could intimidate Kim Jong Un or even scare him. Trump kept on hosting the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as if nothing had happened!

He blinked!

For the very first time, Trump exposed a chink in his otherwise shinning armor as the fearless leader he pretended to be. The very mild reaction of President Trump to the launching of the North Korean missile may have convinced Kim Jong Un that Trump the bully in the White House is not only a bully but is also a despicable coward who displays an angry tone in his bravados when he references all those he considers weak but turns out to be a trembling sissy when the confrontation is with an unpredictable leader who has the capability to deploy nuclear bombs; and unlike Teddy Roosevelt whose negotiating motto was “speak softly, and carry a big stick”, in the case of the current President of the United States the motto seems to be “speak brazenly, but carry a small bag filled with Prozacs and Valiums if things appear to be getting out of hand”. Trump acted just like an aging wolf whose huffing and puffing to bring down a house made of cardboards is useless when he cannot even blow a very small candlelight out. As far as Kim Jong Un is concerned, North Korea can go ahead and launch his ICBM as soon as it is operational, this event can now happen and it most probably will, it is just a matter of time. Up until a few weeks ago there were those who repeatedly stated almost as a slogan “Give Trump a chance” following Ohio Governor John Kasich. Well, Trump already had his chance, and... he blew it! His legions of followers may try to justify him by replying that Trump as President is merely displaying common sense moderation and self-constraint in a highly volatile situation. But Trump did not get elected on a promise that he would use all the time self-constraint and moderation, quite the opposite.

Saying “it won't happen” as coming from his mouth is exactly the same thing as saying “I will not allow such a thing to happen under no conditions”. Same meaning. But then, how can Trump not allow such a thing to happen, if he has already shown his weak spot? He has already been put to the test, and has failed miserably. Instead of speaking in the future tense, he should have used the present tense or the past tense and should have spoken (or in this case, tweeted) something like: “If such a test launch of an ICBM capable of carrying a nuclear warhead happens, I will consider the test launching of such ICBM as an act of war, and I will act accordingly as Commander in Chief of the US Army to ensure that such a thing does not happen again in our lifetimes”, thus ensuring by a good choice of words a clear “cause and effect”, i.e. “If you do this, then I will respond by doing that”, following the rule of causality. Speaking in this latter manner can convey a warning, and indeed it can be a very stern warning. But just saying “it won't happen”, where's the executive action (or executive order) with specifics or details to backup the promise of making impossible a future event that has not yet happened?

If the man running the White House had been General Ike Eisenhower, we know how he would have responded to the North Korean missile launch. But Donald Trump is no Ike Eisenhower, not even close, and unfortunately in the US presidential elections of 2016 there was no one among the candidates to fill in the shoes of someone like General Eisenhower.

Donald Trump may be a bully, he may have a penchant to humiliate anyone who will stand in his way, and as matter of fact he may even be cuckoo as some experts have recently suggested. But even most crazy or mentally unstable people -with the notable exception of suicidal Islamic terrorists- still do have an instinct for survival. And once that instinct for survival kicks in, even someone like Donald Trump is likely to show some moderation. Whatever it takes to see another day. Trump likes to terrorize his adversaries by being unpredictable, but Kim Jong Un is also unpredictable, so in the case of North Korea trying to inflict some sort of punishment may carry with it undesirable and unanticipated consequences. As of February 11, 2017, Kim Jong Un can claim that he has become Trump's nemesis.

To complicate matters further for President Trump, the poisoning of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's half-brother, Kim Jong Nam, was carried out Monday February 13th (it had to have the bad luck number 13 stamp) at Malaysia's Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) before an outbound flight to Macau, just two days later after the launch of the North Korean missile, in what is now believed to have been a state-ordered execution carried out by professional North Korean female agents. This means that Kim Jong Un is a foe worthy of consideration and respect, who is not kidding and should be taken seriously all the time.

Donald Trump enjoys being feared and enjoys humiliating others, flexing his muscle even against neighbors of the USA such as Mexico. In cases like Mexico, Trump speaks tough, but this is because Mexico is no military threat to the United States. Mexico has never tried to develop an atom bomb although by now it certainly has the capabilities and the know-how to do so. Quite the contrary, Mexico has pushed for the full implementation of the Treaty of Tlatelolco, an effort that earned its promoter Alfonso García Robles the Nobel Peace Prize (yes, in spite of what Donald Trump may think of the Mexicans as a conglomerate of good-for-nothing indians who spend their entire days sleeping under the shadow of a cactus, Mexico has several citizens who have earned Nobel prizes). Furthermore, Mexico has made no effort to develop cruise missiles nor to build aircraft carriers (which, by the way, has resulted in a substantial amount of savings). and most of the military capabilities of Mexico are for purely defensive purposes, unlike the USA who has armed itself to the teeth in preparation for offensive actions such as those that have taken place in Vietnam, Iraq, Panama, Grenada and even Mexico itself in places like Veracruz or the invasion that enabled the USA to steal from Mexico more than half of its territory. With no offensive military capabilities of its own to match those of the USA, Mexico has become a favorite target for Trump the bully who has branded Mexicans as criminals, drug dealers and rapists (in his own words: “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists”), and who keeps on insisting to build his Great Wall of Trump in the border with Mexico (to be paid entirely by the US taxpayer, since Mexico has already made it clear it will not pay for something it will not own). Yes, he can act as the miserable bully he is with Mexico, a country that poses no threat to the USA. But in the case of North Korea, well, that's something else, since North Korea has tremendous military capability that scares even neighboring China.

As stated above, during and after the North Korean missile launch, President Trump avoided starting off World War Three or even a tiny squabble with North Korea by focusing his attention on a lavish dinner at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla. on Saturday, February 11, hosting the Prime Minister of Japan on whom he apparently found a new ally and even playing a few rounds of golf. Ah, the lifestyles of the rich and famous!

But hold on a minute! Wasn't it not so long ago since Donald Trump as presidential candidate blasted the US defense of Japan as one-sided, too expensive, by saying: “You know we have a treaty with Japan where if Japan is attacked, we have to use the full force and might of the United States. If we’re attacked, Japan doesn’t have to do anything. They can sit home and watch Sony television, OK?” Trump said he had been told Japan pays “50 percent of the cost” of basing U.S. troops in Japan. “Why don’t they pay 100 percent?” he asked. That was then, before the North Korean missile launch. But now Trump finds it is very convenient, indeed indispensable, to keep a military presence with bases in mainland Japan and Okinawa. Indeed, Trump has finally learned that without Japan as an ally, and deprived of access to all the military bases it now has in Japan, the USA would be more than crippled in a conventional military engagement with North Korea. So at least with Japan there will be no more bullying, and the USA will keep on paying -more than gladly- its 50 per cent share of the cost of basing U.S. troops in Japan. So much for a blabbermouth gone mute.

As if backing off from making good on his threats to North Korea hadn't been a hard enough pill to swallow, there was also this problem with the US relations with another world superpower, China, a country that was severely trounced by then candidate Trump. That was then. However, in reviewing his options now, Trump may have considered the possibility of mustering the help of China to put pressure over North Korea and convince Kim Jong Un to call it quits once and for all with all the missile tests. One way in which Trump could have pressured the Chinese government would have been by using the leadership of North America through the wide commercial alliance of several countries of the Pacific that was conceived by President Obama precisely to counterbalance the growing influence of China in world politics, something called the TPP or Trans Pacific Partnership. But that option is gone for good. In one of his dumbest decisions yet, Trump himself killed such an option, he killed the TPP treaty that took US negotiators several years to carry to fruition, it was one of the very first things he did when he started governing. He no longer has that bargaining chip at his disposal, it's gone for good. A good leader usually tries to hold on to all of his bargaining chips until the very end, but not Trump, he himself discarded TPP as a possible bargaining chip, and now he has none, at least with regards to China. His remaining options, with the exception of taking some unwise kind of military action that both neighbors of North Korea, Russia and China, will object to, are of very limited value. That may be the reason of why Trump, contradicting himself after all the extremely harsh rhetoric he used against China throughout his presidential campaign, and the unexpected move he made by accepting a phone call from the President of Taiwan thereby giving some recognition to Taiwan as an independent state thus defying the One China Policy, Trump agreed to honor the One-China Policy in an 'extremely cordial' call to China's Xi Jinping. So, has Trump finally lost all his marbles, or what? Well, that was then. But now, considering the northern neighbor of North Korea is precisely China, and that China is a world superpower with enough nuclear arsenal to punish the US severely, President Trump “saw the light” and apparently has decided to make very good friends with China, stabbing Taiwan in the back. Thus, even before he blinked with regards to the North Korean missile launch threat, he had already blinked with China, and later he blinked with Japan no longer demanding that Japan pay for the full 100 per cent cost of keeping the strategic US bases in Japan.

In all the days that have passed since the launching of the North Korean missile, for the most part Trump has remained mum on his tweets about the issue, avoiding any further escalation, and it looks that he would like everybody else to forget about the whole issue over a defiant North Korea. The recent scandals involving the contacts made by people on his team with Russian Intelligence has helped him so far in deflecting the attention of the public elsewhere, even at the cost of growing calls for his impeachment and removal from office.

It can be safely assumed that the North Korea Intercontinental Ballistic Missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead is proceeding just as planned at this very moment. There is nothing Donald Trump can do to stop its development. And the time will come when the ICBM North Korean missile is ready for a test launch, perhaps at a moment when such a launch will ruin the digestion of President Donald Trump while hosting a state dinner. And if Trump repeats his infamous and meaningless words “It won't happen!” before the launch takes place, Kim Jong Un may stare at Trump directly on his face (through the news media and the state-run television in North Korea) responding “But it will happen, Monsieur, it will, you can count on it! The question is, what do you intend to do about it?”. And we already know who is most likely to blink first.