Kim Jong Un just tested Trump ahead of the planned summit - and Trump may be caving already

Reuters / KCNA

Kim Jong Un appeared to flip on the US, and now he may have Trump where he wants him.

• North Korea appeared to flip on the US on Tuesday with a broadside against President Donald Trump's administration.
• By threatening to pull out of a summit with Trump, Kim has turned the tables, and potentially put himself in a position to demand concessions from the US.
• It looks like a power move that may already have the US considering concessions to Pyongyang.
• There are already signs that Kim is bluffing, and that Trump may cave to some of Kim's demands to save the summit.

North Korea appeared to turn the tables on the US on Tuesday by threatening to pull out of the upcoming peace summit.

The threat is an apparent broadside against President Donald Trump's administration, looks like a power move that could make the US consider concessions to Pyongyang.

North Korea released statements on Tuesday bashing officials in Trump's administration, cancelling a summit with South Korea, and threatening to withdraw from an upcoming summit between Kim Jong Un and Trump.

In doing so, Kim has turned the tables on Trump, who has built enormous expectations for the meeting.

One statement, from North Korea's state-run media, likened ongoing US and South Korean military exercises to a rehearsal for an invasion, returning to an old talking point from when Trump and Kim were trading nuclear threats in 2017.

In a later statement, A North Korean official expressed "violent anger" at US behavior and said Pyongyang would have to "reconsider" thew meeting with Trump.

The official offered Trump an ultimatum: Cede to North Korea's demands, or lose the summit.

How the tables have turned

Ahn Young-joon/AP

A combo image of Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un

When Trump accepted Kim's offer to meet for a historic summit - which would be the first time a sitting US president has met with a sitting North Korean leader - experts and analysts were more or less united in viewing it as a legitimizing win for Kim.

Kim bought his way to the table with Trump with a single, virtually meaningless word: denuclearization.

The US has long maintained that it will not talk to North Korea unless the prospect of disarmament is on the table.

When Kim started discussing the prospect in early 2018, Trump and his top officials cheered the move as proof that its unique approach to North Korea had worked.

But in statements on Tuesday, North Korea said Trump had employed the same, tired ideas that had failed in the past, and reasserted that its "treasured" nuclear weapons had brought it international power.

Now, after Trump has repeatedly hyped his progress with Pyongyang, it is Kim, the leader of a rogue state, dangling the prospect of a summit to gain concessions from the US.

What North Korea demands, and how Trump might cave to it

KCNA via REUTERS

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un provides guidance with Ri Hong Sop (2nd L) and Hong Sung Mu (R) on a nuclear weapons program in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang September 3, 2017.

North Korea's recent statements push back on longstanding US-South Korean military drills, and call for Trump to back off of his demand of "Complete, Verifiable, and Irreversible Denuclearization."

Already, it looks like the US may cave to save the summit. South Korea's Yonhap News reports that B-52s, a US nuclear bomber, could be pulled from air combat drills in a nod to North Korea's new demands.

But before that, Trump's top officials had already minced words around the aims of talks with North Korea, and the possible definitions of "denuclearization."

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who has been to North Korea twice in the last month or so, has offered slightly different aims for the talks over a series of recent interviews.

While Pompeo often speaks in absolute terms, saying that total denuclearization and removal of nuclear facilities must come before the US eases off Pyongyang, he told CBS's "Face the Nation" that talks with North Korea seek to ensure that "America is no longer held at risk by your nuclear weapons arsenal and that you get rid of [Kim's chemical and biological weapons] program and missiles that that threaten the world."

In other words, Pompeo said the US would accept "a standard that could permit retention of nuclear warheads, facilities, material, and possibly short range missiles," Adam Mount, the Director of the Defense Posture Project at the Federation of American Scientists tweeted.

Kim's master bluff

Twitter/ Blue House

Kim Jong Un leads Moon Jae-in across teh demarcation line into North Korea.

"I can't imagine Kim gives up his summit," North Korea expert Jeffrey Lewis tweeted about North Korea's recent statements.

"I think Kim wants that photo with the President of the United States, paying tribute to him, for the front page" of North Korea's state newspaper."

Similarly, the historic and diplomatic meeting may play well for Trump, motivating him to meet Kim's conditions for talks.

North Korea's recent hardline statements actually contradict Kim's earlier words, when in March South Koreans emerged from talks with Kim saying that he "understands" the military drills, which were ongoing at the time.

Basically, Kim seemed fine with the drills when he was trying to get meetings with Trump and South Korea, but now that he's secured those meetings, he has started to object.

"North Korea is back to its old game of trying to raise the stakes prior to a meeting," former chief of the CIA's Korea division Bruce Klingner tweeted.

"But Kim risks undermining the good will he had built up through his diplomatic outreach since January."

Now, the question for the Trump administration is whether or not to call Kim's apparent bluff, or to quietly meet his demands.

But by backing off from complete denuclearization, Trump could end up with a bad deal. If he calls Kim's bluff, the two leaders could land right back on the nuclear brink.