Author Gordon Chang said President Donald Trump did not fully use his advantage over North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in the recent Singapore summit.
"It (the meeting) was certainly historic — the first time an American president meets with a North Korean leader," Change, a leading expert on Asia, told Fox News.
"Probably a breakthrough. We won’t know that for quite some time. But the other thing is President Trump did fail to press the advantage.
"If you go back to the end of May, clearly President Trump, with brilliant diplomacy, had the North Koreans on the run. He didn't actually use all his leverage at that summit -- therefore the joint statement we got was a little bit vague. That’s not to say that President Trump can’t recover. I’m sure he will because we do have overwhelming leverage. But we now have to struggle a little bit uphill and that’s why Secretary of State (Mike) Pompeo are the president are a little bit defensive these days.
"I would have liked to have wait for the summit, get a joint statement that was specific – that said the North Koreans do agree to give up their nukes, their missiles, their weapons infrastructure.
Chang also said he had wanted to see the issue of verification addressed in the statement.
"The point is we needed to see a little," he said. "I think President Trump can recover because he has the overwhelming leverage, but this is going to be a little bit more difficult for him than it otherwise needed to be.
The New York Times reported that American officials have insisted the vague language in the statement did not mean the U.S. had softened its denuclearization demand.
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