Trump embraced Kim Jong Un as “very honorable” and trusted him after they “fell in love.” He gave Kim legitimacy on the world stage and made a major concession while getting nothing in return. During the past nine months, North Korea has continued to move forward with its missile program. This time around, Trump cannot allow himself to be duped again.

Trump embraced Kim Jong Un as “very honorable” before his first meeting with him.

CNN: “Trump: Kim Jong Un very open and honorable”

Bloomberg: “Trump Praises North Korea’s Kim As ‘Very Honorable’”

Trump implicitly trusted Kim Jong Un, praised their “great chemistry” and said that they “fell in love.”

Trump: “I do trust him, yeah. … I think he trusts me, and I trust him.”

Trump: “We got along better than I would have assumed right from the beginning, and we got a lot more done today than I ever thought possible. And he’s going back. He’s headed back and he, I think he’s going back to get this done, he wants to get it done.” [Hannity, Fox News, 6/12/18]

Trump: “We got along really well. We had a great chemistry — you understand how I feel about chemistry.It’s very important. I mean, I know people where there is no chemistry no matter what you do you just don’t have it. We had it right from the beginning”

Trump: “The relationship was really good. The — you know, it built. And I talked about early on in the relationship and the feeling, well, we have a very good feel right from the beginning.” [Hannity, Fox News, 6/12/18]

Politico: “‘Trump said at the Saturday night rally in Wheeling, W. Va.: ‘He wrote me beautiful letters and they’re great letters. We fell in love.’”

Trump made a major concession to Kim Jong Un in their first meeting without receiving substantial, comparable concessions in return.

New York Times: “ Trump Concession Over Military Drills Blindsides Many South Koreans”

Associated Press: “Trump contradicts US military stance on Korea war games”

New York Times: “President Trump shook hands with Kim Jong-un of North Korea on Tuesday and offered a major concession during the first summit meeting between their nations, a momentous step in an improbable courtship between the world’s largest nuclear power and the most reclusive one.”

NBC News: “When President Donald Trump agreed to pause military exercises between the U.S. and South Korea on Tuesday, he gave Kim Jong Un a concession on an issue that has angered North Korea like few others.”

Even after Trump’s concession and his implicit trust for Kim Jong Un, North Korea continued to move forward with its missile program.

New York Times: “North Korea is moving ahead with its ballistic missile program at 16 hidden bases that have been identified in new commercial satellite images, a network long known to American intelligence agencies but left undiscussed as President Trump claims to have neutralized the North’s nuclear threat. The satellite images suggest that the North has been engaged in a great deception.”

NBC News: “With a second U.S.-North Korea nuclear summit looming in February, researchers have discovered a secret ballistic missile base in North Korea — one of as many as 20 undisclosed missile sites in the country, according to the researchers’ new report. The Kim regime has never disclosed the existence of the Sino-ri Missile Operating Base to the outside world.’”