Book warns Washington repeats flawed North Korea diplomacy from Clinton to Biden

Frederick H. Fleitz, a former insider at the CIA, State Department, House Intelligence Committee and the National Security Council, uses his experience to chart a three-decade cycle of U.S. engagement with North Korea. The book opens with Jimmy Carter’s 1994 private trip to Pyongyang, which produced the Agreed Framework despite his lack of authority, illustrating how Washington often rewards informal talks with concessions.

Fleitz argues that Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump and Biden each entered negotiations while politically vulnerable, resulting in agreements that Pyongyang later ignored. He details specific episodes, such as the Bush administration’s dismissal of uranium-enrichment intelligence and the Trump administration’s tough sanctions package, to show a pattern of weakness inviting defiance. The author stresses that the only moment North Korea backed down was in 2018 when faced with a president threatening its destruction. Fleitz’s conclusion is that strength, not accommodation, is the only effective lever against the regime’s nuclear program.