Negotiations & History

In less than 3 hours the meeting between Trump and Kim will go down.

For those with short memories, journalists and North Korean experts were up in arms a few short weeks back after Trump "canceled" negotiations. The furor they raised just confirmed how little they (or really most people for that matter) know about negotiations. Negotiations are never over until they are over, and while parties may kick and scream during negotiations, when the ink dries on a final, signed agreement everything except what has been agreed upon is forgotten.

Despite the negotiations pushing ahead and even after the summit was declared on again, you have a bunch of ideologues criticizing the whole meeting citing past North Korean atrocities as evidence that the US is negotiating not just with a terrorist but a war criminal. 

Everyone knows North Korea has been a shitty place to live, and some people were really fucked over. You can also say the same thing about really any group or nation throughout history, including the US and South Korea. But the key things to look out for are the moments when things may change and benefit a huge swathe or group of people.

The meeting between Trump and Kim may be one of those moments, but also it may not be. That said, directionally they are heading towards one of those moments where the past of North Korea will be (largely) forgotten so that a future can be opened up where many more people than were fucked over in the past can benefit. That is how history, thought broadly, is written.

So, to summarize: Negotiations are finalized when participants agree to do one thing or a set of things while forgetting everything else in much the same way that history is written about one thing or a set of things while omitting everything else. When you see people only focusing on the "everything else" on Twitter or on the news or at the bar, ask them why they are focusing on everything else.