Friday on Fox News Channel’s “America’s Newsroom,” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) said he did not believe North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un will give up his nuclear weapons despite reaching out to meet with President Donald Trump.
Rubio said, “I don’t believe that that is. Let me just say, though, Donald Trump was elected because of his willingness to do things that other politicians and presidents haven’t done, and this is right along the lines of that so I won’t be critical of it. I ultimately think that Kim Jong-un deeply believes that the only way he survives and doesn’t become Qaddafi or Saddam Hussein is if he has nuclear weapons. If he gives them up, there’s no reason why they won’t come in after him.”
Rubio went on to explain his pessimism over the possibilities of achieving denuclearization.
“So, I think there is two things happening here,” he said. “Number one, the pressure of the sanctions is so intense, and the fear that Donald Trump will attack him militarily is so deep, and there are so many complaints by his elites around him that he is forced to do something at least to buy time and create some sense of hope that things might improve. The other thing that might be happening is, he’s luring us into these negotiations, but then he will make demands that he knows we can never agree to like the U.S. abandoning South Korea. At that point, he will go to the world and say, ‘I’ve been very reasonable, I met with the president, I’ve been willing to be flexible, but these guys don’t want to deal with me.’ That’s designed to get the international community to back off of sanctions and not support a unilateral U.S. military action.”
Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN