蒂勒森去职，“金特会”变数增多

美国总统唐纳德·特朗普解雇最高外交官，使得他与朝鲜领导人金正恩的首脑会晤计划，面临更大的风险。

雷克斯·蒂勒森在被解雇前的几个月内，曾就是否应该与朝鲜对话和总统发生冲突，特朗普同意与金正恩会面之前也未征求蒂勒森的意见。已被提名为国务卿的鹰派中央情报局局长迈克·蓬佩奥对特朗普仓促决定接受会谈邀请的作法进行了辩护。

“金特会”存在巨大的风险。特朗普将成为首位与朝鲜领导人会晤的在任美国总统。如果会谈顺利，将为未来的谈判奠定基础。但双方领导人也可能发生冲突，重提摧毁对方国家的威胁。

由于蒂勒森在被解雇之前就已经被边缘化，因此可能正是蓬佩奥放大了特朗普依靠自己直觉的欲望，而这正是朝鲜观察家们担心的问题之一。此前特朗普多次警告采取军事行动，以阻止金正恩开发核武器，而美国防部长詹姆斯·马蒂斯和蒂勒森的态度却较为温和。

哈佛大学肯尼迪学院（Harvard Kennedy School）的韩国工作组主任约翰·朴表示，“金特会”将是一次复杂的谈判，“在迈出第一步之前，你必须想到最后一步。”他说道：“这些年断断续续的谈判如同在攀爬山峰，但在登顶之后又从山的另一面滑落下来。已经宣布的5月份‘金特会’就是一座高峰。如果会谈失败，我们会被摔得粉身碎骨。”

特朗普只是根据韩国官员的简报接受了朝方的邀请，根本没有看到任何书面文件。蒂勒森在最后一次官方发言中表示，朝鲜甚至没有与美国接触，确定会晤细节。

即便会谈顺利举行，出现错判的风险非常高。朝鲜到现在仍未确认是否愿意放弃核武器。最近与金正恩会面的韩国特使，着重向特朗普传达了这一点。

特朗普在3月9日发推文称：“金正恩与韩国代表讨论了无核化议题，不止是冻结核武项目。”

另外，特朗普身边缺少有经验的朝鲜问题专家，也会增加“金特会”的不确定性。在蒂勒森被解雇之前，美国朝鲜问题特别代表尹汝尚已经宣布辞职。美国国务院目前仍未委任驻首尔常驻大使，也未任命东亚与太平洋事务助理国务卿。

前美国驻韩大使候选人车维德表示，如果特朗普对金正恩愿意提出的条件不满意，战争风险将会加大。朝鲜将原子武器视为抵御美国入侵的底牌，并且一直希望美国将其作为核国家对待。

车维德在3月11日写道：“首脑级别的谈判失败，将导致各方没有任何外交回旋余地。”车维德在2004年至2007年期间曾担任朝鲜问题多方会谈的美国代表团副团长。

多条沟通渠道

上周一，对于蒂勒森被解雇一事，韩国方面反应平淡。韩国表示韩美之间有多个沟通渠道。与此同时，韩国外交部长康京和仍计划在本周出访美国。原访问计划中包括一次与蒂勒森的会面。

要求匿名的多位韩国官员表示，他们认为蓬佩奥接任国务卿，只是特朗普在提拔他所信任的人，并不代表美国将对朝鲜采取更强硬的立场。

尽管如此，韩国方面的担忧仍在日益增多。

上周三，韩国世宗研究院（Sejong Institute）的研究员朴志光在一篇报告中写道：“特朗普对于此次会谈的态度，与韩国政府对美朝对话的预期不同，特朗普可能将其视为采取军事行动之前的最后一次外交努力。韩国迫切希望确定蒂勒森离职的影响，以便于采取恰当的应对措施。”

前国会议员蓬佩奥在去年加入中央情报局。在去年七月份召开的一次安全论坛上，蓬佩奥称朝鲜问题是特朗普最关注的问题。

他表示：“半岛无核化和消除核武器当然是好事，但现在控制核武器的人才是最危险的。所以从美国政府的角度讲，最重要的事是将武器和控制人分开。”

金正恩计划首先与韩国总统文在寅举行一次首脑会议。文在寅一直反对对朝鲜采取军事行动。但随着蒂勒森的离开，特朗普政府中支持这种观点的人可能会越来越少。

堪培拉澳大利亚战略政策研究所（Australian Strategic Policy Institute）的资深分析师马尔科姆·戴维斯表示：“蒂勒森和马蒂斯为特朗普提供了看待世界的不同视角，可以有效调和特朗普的立场。而白宫内部的鹰派增多，自然会带来风险。”（财富中文网）

译者：刘进龙/汪皓 

President Donald Trump’s firing of his top diplomat raises the stakes even further for his proposed summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

In the months before his ouster, Rex Tillerson bumped heads with the president over whether to talk to North Korea — and wasn’t consulted before Trump agreed to meet Kim. Mike Pompeo, the hawkish CIA chief nominated to replace him as secretary of state, has defended Trump’s snap decision on the talks.

The stakes are incredibly high for any Trump-Kim meeting, which would be the first for a sitting U.S. president. The meeting may go well, and set the stage for further talks. Or the leaders may clash and revert to threats to annihilate each other’s country.

While Tillerson already appeared on the outer before his firing, Pompeo could amplify Trump’s desire to rely on his own instincts, and that’s a concern for North Korea watchers. Along with Defense Secretary James Mattis, Tillerson served as a voice for moderation as Trump repeatedly warned of military action to stop Kim’s nuclear weapons development.

A meeting with Kim would be a complex negotiation in which “you need to know the last step before you take the first one,” said John Park, director of the Korea Working Group at Harvard Kennedy School. “Those years of on-and-off negotiations were like climbing peaks and then sliding down the other side,” Park said. “The announced Trump-Kim meeting in May is a very high peak. If it fails, we crash.”

Trump accepted the invitation based on a briefing from South Korean officials without seeing anything in writing. In one of his last official remarks, Tillerson said that North Korea hadn’t even been in touch with the U.S. to sort out the details.

If a meeting materializes, the risk of miscalculation is high. North Korea has yet to confirm that it’s willing to give up its nuclear weapons. That was a crucial point conveyed to Trump by South Korean envoys who recently met with Kim.

“Kim Jong Un talked about denuclearization with the South Korean Representatives, not just a freeze,” Trump tweeted on March 9.

Adding to the uncertainty is the lack of experienced North Korea hands in Trump’s circle. Before Tillerson’s ouster, Joseph Yun, the U.S. special representative for North Korea, announced he was stepping down. The State Department doesn’t have a permanent ambassador in Seoul, or a confirmed assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs.

Victor Cha, once a candidate for ambassador to South Korea, said the risk of war would grow if Trump ends up disappointed over what Kim is willing to offer. North Korea sees atomic weapons as essential to deter a U.S. invasion, and has sought to be treated as a nuclear power.

“Failed negotiations at the summit level leave all parties with no other recourse for diplomacy,” Cha, deputy head of the U.S. delegation at multi country talks on North Korea from 2004 to 2007, wrote on March 11.

Multiple Channels

South Korea on Monday had a muted response to Tillerson’s firing, saying it has multiple channels of communication with the U.S., while Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha still plans a trip to the U.S. this week that initially included a meeting with Tillerson.

South Korean officials who asked not to be identified said they assessed Pompeo’s promotion more as a move by Trump to put in someone he trusts, rather than a shift to a harder line on North Korea.

Still, concerns in South Korea are growing.

“Unlike the South Korean government’s blueprint for the U.S.-North Korea dialogue, it could be that Trump is regarding this talk as the last diplomatic attempt before carrying out a military action,” Park Jee-kwang, a research associate at the Sejong Institute, said in a report Wednesday. “South Korea is in a desperate position to find out what Tillerson’s departure implies and come up with appropriate measures.”

Pompeo is a former member of Congress who joined the CIA last year. At a security forum last July, Pompeo said North Korea is at the front of Trump’s mind.

“It would be a great thing to denuclearize the peninsula, to get those weapons off of that, but the thing that is most dangerous about it is the character who holds the control over them today,” Pompeo said. “From the administration’s perspective, the most important thing we can do is separate those two.”

Kim is scheduled to first have a summit with South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who opposes any military action against the regime. With Tillerson out, Moon may have fewer people within Trump’s administration who agree with his position.

“Tillerson along with Mattis provided a natural break to Trump by providing alternative perspectives on the world,” said Malcolm Davis, a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute in Canberra. “There is certainly the risk that there are more hawkish elements in the White House.”