Reuters
- Trump offered Kim Jong Un a ride home on Air Force One, a new BBC series has revealed.
- The two had met for their second negotiations in Vietnam in 2019, which eventually broke down.
- Trump said he could get Kim home in two hours, but the former declined the invitation.
- Visit the Business section of Insider for more stories.
Former President Donald Trump offered North Korean leader Kim Jong Un a ride home on Air Force One after the two met for a second time at a summit in Hanoi, Vietnam, in 2019, a new BBC documentary has revealed.
The three-part series, titled “Trump Takes On the World,” discloses new details about how Trump and Kim negotiated North Korea’s nuclear program, which eventually ended without a deal.
Trump, who had left the meeting abruptly, told the press at the time: “Sometimes you just have to walk.”
But the former president didn’t leave without making an unusual offer first.
“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.
“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.’ It was a gracious gesture,” he added.
Kim declined the offer, according to Pottinger.
Photo by MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images
The BBC series also includes an interview with Trump’s former national security advisor John Bolton, who was present at the summit.
Bolton said that as they drove to the meeting, Trump was confident that he could forge a deal once he was in the room with Kim.
“Trump obviously thought he had a new best friend in Kim Jong Un,” Bolton, who has since fallen out with Trump, said, according to the Sunday Times. “Trump thought that US-North Korea relations were great because he and Kim were buddies. It’s a very dangerous perception.”
Kim and Trump ended up meeting for a third and last time in the Korean demilitarized zone three months later but there was no further progress.
The pair had a complicated relationship during Trump’s four years as president.
Trump had called North Korea’s leader a “Little Rocket Man” and made threats of “fire and fury” but later suggested they were very good friends, and even described him as “a very smart guy,” according to the BBC.
“Trump Takes on the World,” directed by Tim Stirzaker, will be broadcast on BBC2 on Wednesday.
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