I suggest to Kim Jong-un that he should issue a personal challenge to President Donald Trump to a duel: chess boards at three paces, perhaps a single game of chess, the terms of which should be that if Kim Jong-un wins, then the United States takes its toys and goes home: lifts all sanctions, brings its troops home from the Pacific Region, and allows the North Koreans to arrange their own affairs; but if Donald Trump wins the game, then Kim Jong-un will step down, and allow Uncle Sam to set up any puppet government of its choosing in his place.
Put up or shut up.
No matter who wins, it would be a great relief to have this settled. All international disputes, in these days of nuclear weapons, should be submitted to the ordeal by chessboard. My first thought was that each country might designate a champion, and the date for the match set six months ahead, but that were to miss the point: the challenge from Korea is a personal confrontation between the parties, and can only be decided by the principles, not the seconds.
There are many other ways in which this international itching point between equally unstable belligerents might play out (does it feel good to scratch it?); but some of those might be less benign that the ordeal by chessboard.
