Donald Trump offered Kim Jong-un ‘a ride home on Air Force One’ after Hanoi summit, documentary claims
- US president ‘stunned even the most seasoned diplomats’ by offering Kim a lift home after 2019 summit in Vietnam, according to new BBC documentary
- Kim and Trump embarked on an extraordinary diplomatic ‘bromance’ over the years that featured headline-grabbing summits and a declaration of love
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According to BBC documentary Trump Takes on the World, the US president “stunned even the most seasoned diplomats” by offering Kim a lift home on Air Force One after the 2019 summit in Vietnam.
If Kim had accepted the offer, it would have put the North Korean leader – and probably some of his entourage – inside the US president’s official aircraft and seen it enter North Korean airspace, raising multiple security issues. In the event, Kim turned it down.
“President Trump offered Kim a lift home on Air Force One,” Matthew Pottinger, the top Asia expert on Trump’s National Security Council, told the BBC, it reported at the weekend.
“The president knew that Kim had arrived on a multi-day train ride through China into Hanoi and the president said: ‘I can get you home in two hours if you want.’ Kim declined.”
During the Singapore summit, Trump gave Kim a glimpse inside his presidential state car – a US$1.5 million Cadillac also known as “The Beast” – in a show of their newly friendly rapport.
North Korea looms as next big test for China-US relations
But last month Kim said the US was his nuclear-armed nation’s “biggest enemy”, adding that Washington’s “policy against North Korea will never change” no matter “who is in power”.
