text:
North Korea–United States relations

Relations between North Korea and the United States have been historically hostile. The two countries have no formal diplomatic relations. Instead, they have adopted an indirect diplomatic arrangement using neutral intermediaries. The Swedish Embassy in Pyongyang is the US protecting power and provides limited consular services to U.S. citizens. North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), does not have an embassy in Washington, DC, but is represented in the United States through its mission to the United Nations in New York City which serves as North Korea's de facto embassy.

The source of the hostilities dates back to the Korean War in which both countries fought on opposite sides. Since the armistice was signed, areas of contention have since revolved around North Korea's nuclear weapons program and missile tests, North Korea's human rights record, U.S. sanctions against North Korea, and military exercises held by the U.S. and South Korea. Despite no formal diplomatic relations, both sides have maintained contact to deescalate tensions. According to the policy objectives of the U.S. State Department, "Peace and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula is the ultimate goal for the United States in its relationship with the DPRK".

Defining issues of contention
In recent years relations have been largely defined by heavy U.S. military presence in South Korea, joint U.S.–South Korea military exercises in the South China Sea, US economic sanctions against North Korea for North Korea's nuclear program and North Korea's demand that the United States eliminate its nuclear arsenal that could reach the Korean peninsula.

North Korea has conducted six tests of nuclear weapons between 2006 and 2017. It has developed long-range missiles capable of striking targets thousands of miles away, possibly as far away as the continental United States, and threatened to strike the United States (as recently as 2013) and South Korea with nuclear weapons and conventional forces.

The United States' nuclear weapons program in nearby Guam consists of B-1B Lancer bombers and B-2 Spirit bombers capable of launching nuclear weapons "60 times more destructive than the bomb dropped on Nagasaki." From Guam, the U.S. conducts precision strike exercises to simulate a preemptive nuclear strike on North Korea.

Since the Korean War, the United States has maintained a strong military presence in South Korea with 28,500 troops, 90 Patriot missiles and five military bases.

The United States has not adopted a No First Use nuclear weapons policy. North Korea's stated policy position is that nuclear weapons "will never be abused or used as a means for preemptive strike", but if there is an "attempt to have recourse to military force against us" North Korea may use their "most powerful offensive strength in advance to punish them".

Polling on U.S.–North Korea relations
In a 2020 YouGov poll conducted in the run-up to the US presidential election, the Washington-based Korea Economic Institute (KEI) of America, which commissioned the poll, reported only 31% of respondents approved of President Donald Trump's diplomatic overtures to North Korea, though a senior director at KEI conjectured support for diplomatic relations was weakened by Trump's calling Kim Jong Un, North Korea's leader, a "friend" and saying "they fell in love with each other."

Support among the American public for US forces to defend South Korea has increased steadily. While it was at a mere 26% in 1990, it nearly tripled to 62% in 2017, and in 2020, more than six in 10 Americans viewed the U.S. military alliance with South Korea as advantageous, with over half wanting to maintain the US troop level at nearly 30,000 soldiers. In 2017, a majority of the American public also had a positive view of Moon Jae-in, the South Korean President, who in 2018 supported a formal declaration to end the U.S.–North Korean war.

As relations with Korea waxed hot and cold under President Trump, American public opinion regarding North Korea likewise fluctuated sharply, and no clear picture emerges. In a 2020 Gallup Poll, only 12% of the Americans surveyed gave North Korea a positive rating.

A Harris poll published in 2023 found that 68% of United States respondents believed that Joe Biden should offer direct talks with Kim Jong-Un. 58% agreed that the United States should offer North Korea with economic or diplomatic incentives in exchange for steps towards de-nuclearization.

History
Following World War II, the United Nations divided Korea along the 38th parallel, intending this as a temporary measure. A breakdown in relations between the U.S. and USSR, however, prevented a reunification. As a result, in August 1945, the U.S. and U.S.S.R. divided control over the Korean Peninsula, with the Soviet Army and its proxies supporting a communist government in the North and the U.S. supporting a capitalist government in the South.

Pre–Korean War (1948–1950)
On September 9, 1948, Kim Il Sung declared the Democratic People's Republic of Korea; he promptly received diplomatic recognition from the Soviet Union, but not the United States. The U.S. did not extend, and has never extended formal diplomatic recognition to the DPRK. Kim Il-Sung's anti-American rhetoric often asserted that the U.S. was a capitalist and imperialist successor to Japan, Korea's colonial occupier from 1910 to 1945. In December 1950, the United States initiated economic sanctions against the DPRK under the Trading with the Enemy Act, which lasted until 2008.

October–December 1950
The War started on June 25, 1950, when 75,000 soldiers from the Korean People's Army crossed the 38th Parallel to invade South Korea, spawning the first military action of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. An estimated five million soldiers and civilians lost their lives in what has been termed "The Forgotten War" sandwiched between World War II and the Vietnam War. During the Korean War, the U.S. carpet bombed North Korea, dropping 635,000 tons of bombs and 32,557 tons of napalm — more weaponry than the United States used against the Japanese during World War II. The head of the Strategic Air Command, Curtis LeMay, said the U.S. killed 20 percent of the population of Korea.

Consideration of atomic bomb
In 1950, when President Harry S. Truman was concerned about the Chinese People's Volunteer Army seizing South Korea, he said dropping an atomic bomb on North Korea was under "active consideration."

General Douglas MacArthur, who headed the United Nations Command during the Korean War, wanted to drop “between 30 and 50 atomic bombs ... strung across the neck of Manchuria” that would have “spread behind us ... a belt of radioactive cobalt.”

B-29 bombers, capable of carrying atomic bombs, were sent to Guam, though the bombs lacked a plutonium core.

Historians theorize Truman, who had authorized atomic weapons that incinerated 200,000 Japanese in WWII, chose not to use nuclear weapons during the Korean War for multiple reasons: fear of escalation to a third World War; opposition from U.S. allies; lack of large urban centers to target in North Korea.

Public opinion
Public support in the United States to commit ground troops to Korea was at first, remarkably high. In June 1950, 78% of Americans said they approved of Truman's decision to send military aid, and 15% disapproved. But as soon as January 1951, public support for the war had plummeted to 38%.

Armistice
In 1953, the United Nations Command, North Korea, and China signed the Korean War Armistice Agreement for exchanging prisoners of war, marking a north–south boundary within a demilitarized zone, and suspending fighting. A formal peace treaty, however, was never signed.

In 1953, the U.S. signed a mutual security treaty, promising to defend South Korea from North Korean aggression by stationing U.S. troops along the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and including South Korea under the U.S. nuclear umbrella. The U.S. pledged to use nuclear weapons to deter and, if necessary, prevail in an attack on the South. In 1991, the U.S. removed its tactical nuclear weapons from the Korean peninsula after North Korea conditioned international inspections on their removal.

Post–Korean War

In the early 1960s, several American soldiers defected to North Korea. Only one defector, Charles Jenkins, returned to the U.S. and faced a U.S. military court, pleading guilty to charges of desertion and aiding the enemy. Jerry Parrish, Larry Abshier and James Dresnok died of natural causes in North Korea.

Some leafleting of North Korea was resumed after the heavy leafleting that took place in the Korean War, such Operation Jilli from 1964 to 1968. One leaflet was on one side a successful reproduction of a North Korean one won note, about six weeks' pay for an ordinary North Korean soldier, and on the other a safe conduct pass for defection to the south. The rationale was to allow soldiers to easily hide the pass, but the quality was sufficient for it to gain some use as a fraudulent banknote in North Korea.

Pueblo incident
On January 23, 1968, Korean People's Navy patrol boats intercepted the United States Navy spy ship USS Pueblo in disputed waters, capturing and transferring the crew of 83 men to Pyongyang for imprisonment and torture. After almost a year of coerced confessions, beatings and a staged news conference, the crew was released following a negotiated settlement in which the U.S. apologized and pledged to stop spying on North Korea.

U.S. spy plane
On April 15, 1969, the U.S. Navy spy plane EC-121 was shot down over the Sea of Japan by North Korea; 31 American service men died. Historians theorize President Richard Nixon, embroiled in the Vietnam War, chose not to retaliate for fear of escalating the conflict to involve the Soviet Union and China.

Axe murder incident
On August 18, 1976, US Army Captain Arthur Bonifas and Lieutenant Mark Barrett were killed by the KPA with axes at Panmunjom when the Americans, over objections of North Koreans, continued trimming a tree that blocked the view of the United States Army–Republic of Korea Army military unit patrolling the Joint Security Area—an intensely guarded and combative area in the middle of the DMZ separating North and South Korea. President Gerald Ford responded with a show of force, authorizing DEFCON 3, a high state of military readiness. The North Korean government backed down and allowed the tree-cutting to go ahead in what the U.S. military termed "Operation Paul Bunyan." North Korean supreme leader Kim Il Sung said the incidents in the Joint Security Area were "regretful" but stopped short of meeting U.S. demands for a formal apology.

North Korea and the United States had little to no relations during this time, except through the structures created by the Korean Armistice Agreement.

North Korea policy under Bill Clinton

In 1994, North Korea blocked international inspectors from verifying the regime's adherence to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. The Bill Clinton administration believed that the North Koreans were processing plutonium from a reactor to build two atomic bombs.

President Clinton recalled that "I was determined to prevent North Korea from developing a nuclear arsenal, even at the risk of war". Declassified Clinton-era documents illustrate that the administration had planned for a possible war during the 1994 nuclear crisis.

According to former Pentagon officials, the Clinton administration drew plans to strike the North Korea nuclear reactor at Yongbyon.

In December 1994 a US OH-58 Kiowa helicopter was shot down over North Korea, a pilot died and another was captured by North Korea and held for 13 days.

Confrontations during Bush administration
In December 2002, Spanish Navy troops, at the request of the U.S., boarded and detained a shipment of Scud missiles from North Korea destined for Yemen. After two days, following protests from Yemen and North Korea, the United States released the ship to continue its shipment to Yemen. This further strained the relationship between the US and North Korea, with North Korea characterizing the boarding an "act of piracy."

In September 2005, the US alleged that North Korea produced $15–25 million worth of counterfeit Federal Reserve supernotes over several years for worldwide distribution in a "direct attack on a protected U.S. asset.". Some governments questioned whether the DPRK had the capability to produce such high-quality notes.

Additionally, the U.S. accused Banco Delta Asia, a bank in Macau, of laundering money for North Korea's nuclear program, though the bank called the accusation a joke. In 2007, an audit by Ernst & Young found no evidence that Macau banks had facilitated North Korean money-laundering.

At various times during the Bush administration Dong Moon Joo, the president of The Washington Times, undertook unofficial diplomatic missions to North Korea in an effort to improve relations.

Steps towards normalization
On February 13, 2007, agreement in the Six-Party Talks – among the United States, the two Koreas, Japan, China, and Russia – called for other actions besides a path toward a denuclearized Korean peninsula. It also outlined steps toward the normalization of political relations with Pyongyang, a replacement of the Korean Armistice Agreement with a peace treaty, and the building of a regional peace structure for Northeast Asia.

In exchange for substantial fuel aid, North Korea agreed to shut down the Yongbyon nuclear facility. The United States also agreed to begin discussions on normalization of relations with North Korea, and to begin the process of removing North Korea from its list of state sponsors of terrorism. The US Chief Negotiator Christopher R. Hill stated North Korea has adhered to its commitments. The sixth round of talks commencing on March 19, 2007, discussed the future of the North Korean nuclear weapons program.

In early June 2008, the United States agreed to start lifting restrictions after North Korea began the disarming process. President George W. Bush announced he would remove North Korea from the list of state sponsors of terrorism after North Korea released a 60-page declaration of its nuclear activities. Shortly thereafter North Korean officials demolished the nuclear reactor at Yongbyon, considered a symbol of North Korea's nuclear program. The Bush administration praised the progress, but was criticized by many, including some within the administration, for settling for too little.

The United States public has historically favored diplomatic approaches over military ones in regards to North Korea. One study found that in 2004 the way the US government and the news media framed North Korea, led to such increased support for a non-military solutions among the American people.

Dai Hong Dan incident

On November 4, 2007, Dai Hong Dan, a North Korean merchant vessel, was attacked by Somali pirates off the coast of Mogadishu who forced their way aboard, posing as guards. As U.S. Navy ships patrolling the waters moved to respond, the 22 North Korean seamen fought the eight Somali pirates in hand-to-hand combat. With aid from the crew of the United States Navy destroyer USS James E. Williams and a helicopter, the ship was freed, and permission was given to the U.S. crew to treat the wounded crew and pirates. This resulted in favorable comments from U.S. envoy in Beijing, Christopher R. Hill, as well as an exceedingly rare pro-U.S. statement in the North Korean press:

"We feel grateful to the United States for its assistance given to our crewmen. This case serves as a symbol of the DPRK-U.S. cooperation in the struggle against terrorism."

The favorable result of the incident occurred at an important moment, as the North Koreans moved to implement the February 13 agreement with the acquiescence of the Bush administration, and the 2007 South Korean presidential election loomed, with the North Koreans taking pains to emphasize a more moderate policy.

New York Philharmonic visit
In February 2008, the New York Philharmonic visited North Korea. The concert was broadcast on Korean Central Television.

North Korean detention of American journalists
American-North Korean relations have further been strained by the arrest of two American journalists on March 17, 2009. The two journalists, Euna Lee and Laura Ling of Current TV, were arrested on the China–North Korea border while supposedly filming a documentary on the trafficking of women and allegedly crossing into North Korea in the process. North Korea subsequently tried the two journalists amid international protests and found them guilty of the charges, and sentenced them to twelve years of hard labor. Reporters without Borders criticized the act as a "sham trial".

The ordeal was finally resolved on August 4, when former President Bill Clinton arrived in Pyongyang in what he described as a "solely private mission" to secure the release of the two American journalists. He reportedly forwarded a message to North Korean leader Kim Jong Il from then-U.S. President Barack Obama, but White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs denied this claim. Clinton's discussions with Kim were reportedly on various issues regarding American-North Korean relations. On August 5, Kim issued a formal pardon to the two American journalists, who subsequently returned to Los Angeles with Clinton. The unannounced visit by Clinton was the first by a high-profile American official since 2000, and is reported to have drawn praise and understanding by the parties involved.

ROKS Cheonan sinking
On May 24, 2010, the United States set plans to participate in new military exercises with South Korea as a direct military response to the sinking of a South Korean warship by what officials called a North Korean torpedo.

On May 28, 2010, the official (North) Korean Central News Agency stated that "it is the United States that is behind the case of 'Cheonan.' The investigation was steered by the U.S. from its very outset." It also accused the United States of manipulating the investigation and named the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama directly of using the case for "escalating instability in the Asia-Pacific region, containing big powers and emerging unchallenged in the region." The report indicated to the United States to "behave itself, mindful of the grave consequences."

In July 2010, the DPRK government indefinitely postponed a scheduled talk at Panmunjom relating to the sinking. The meeting was intended as preparation for future talks at higher governmental levels.

Relations following Kim Jong-il's death
Just over two years later on March 16, 2012, North Korea announced it would launch its Kwangmyŏngsŏng-3 satellite to mark the 100th anniversary of the late Kim Il-sung's birthday. This announcement triggered American anxiety as satellite launches are technologically contiguous with missile launches. This tampered with Kim Jong Un's earlier optimistic overtures and generated speculation on the issues confronting the new and young leader back in North Korea. The United States also suspended food aid to North Korea in retaliation for the missile plans.

Daniel Russel, Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director of Asia, and Sydney Seiler flew to Pyongyang from Guam in August 2012 and stayed there for two days. A South Korean diplomatic source said "apparently President Barack Obama, who was then bidding for a second term in office, secretly sent the officials to North Korea to minimize disruptions to the U.S. presidential election." Other analysts say, "Nobody can rule out that such direct dialogue between Washington and Pyongyang will continue in the future."

However, on December 11, 2012, North Korea successfully launched a missile in contrast to its failure in March. The United States strongly condemned the action as it was widely believed that North Korea was developing long-range ballistic missile that could reach the West Coast of the United States.

On March 29, 2013, Kim Jong Un threatened the United States by "declaring that rockets were ready to be fired at American bases in the Pacific." The declaration was in response to two B2 stealth bombers that flew over the Korean peninsula on the day before. After Jong-un's declaration, the Pentagon called for an advanced missile defense system to the western Pacific on April 3. United States Secretary of Defense, Chuck Hagel, said that North Korea posed "a real and clear danger" to not only the United States, but Japan and South Korea as well. The deployment of the battery to the US territory of Guam is the biggest demonstration yet that Washington regards the confrontation with North Korea as more worrying than similar crises of the past few years. It also suggested they are preparing for long standoff. While visiting Seoul, South Korea on April 12, 2013, United States Secretary of State, John Kerry, said "North Korea will not be accepted as a nuclear power", and that a missile launch by North Korea would be a "huge mistake". On April 18, 2013, North Korea issued conditions for which any talks would take place with Washington D.C. or Seoul. They included lifting United Nations sanctions and an end to United States-South Korean Key Resolve military exercises.

On April 26, 2013, North Korea said it had arrested a U.S. citizen for committing an unspecified crime against the country. U.S. officials said that person was Kenneth Bae. On May 2, 2013, Bae was convicted of "hostile acts" and sentenced to 15 years of hard labor. The U.S. has called for his release but North Korea has rejected any possibility of allowing prominent Americans to visit the country to request his release. Dennis Rodman, who had previously visited North Korea and become friends with Kim Jong Un, tweeted a plea for Bae's release. Rodman has since said he will visit North Korea again in August and attempt to free Bae. On May 2, 2014, Pyongyang's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) released an article composed of four essays written by North Korean citizens. The content of the article carried heavy criticism and racist remarks towards U.S. President Barack Obama.

Two American citizens were detained in North Korea in June 2014, accused of "hostile acts". On July 28, 2014, the United States House of Representatives voted to pass the North Korea Sanctions Enforcement Act of 2013 (H.R. 1771; 113th Congress), but it was never passed by the Senate. On August 20, 2014, during annual U.S.–South Korea military drills, a spokesman for the North Korean government referred to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry as a "wolf donning the mask of sheep", the latest in an exchange of taunts between U.S., South Korean and North Korean government officials. In January 2015, U.S. President Barack Obama indicated that he believed that over time the North Korean government will collapse. On July 28, 2016, a North Korean top diplomat for U.S. affairs claimed that the United States crossed the "red line" for putting leader Kim Jong Un on its list of sanctioned individuals, which was perceived by officials as the United States declaring war.

Women cross DMZ
On May 24, 2015, International Women's Day for Disarmament, thirty women—including US feminist leader Gloria Steinem, two Nobel Peace laureates and retired U.S. Colonel Ann Wright—from 15 countries linked arms with 10,000 Korean women, stationing themselves on both sides of the DMZ to urge a formal end to the Korean War (1950–1953), the reunification of families divided during the war, and a peace building process with women in leadership positions to resolve decades of hostility.

In the weeks leading up to crossing the DMZ, Steinem told the press, "It's hard to imagine any more physical symbol of the insanity of dividing human beings."

On the day of the crossing, South Korea refused to give the women permission to walk through Panmunjom, a border town where the 1953 truce was signed, so the women had to eventually cross the border by bus. Nevertheless, Steinem labeled the crossing a success. "We have accomplished what no one said can be done, which is to be a trip for peace, for reconciliation, for human rights and a trip to which both governments agreed."

Trump administration (2017–2021)

In 2017, tensions mounted as U.S. President Donald Trump weighed military options against North Korea's ballistic missile program. In the second week of April 2017, global media outlets erroneously reported that the USS Carl Vinson supercarrier had been deployed to the Sea of Japan heading towards North Korea, as a result of confusion created by a "miscommunication" between the "Pentagon and the White House." A premature announcement on April 8 from the Navy led to a "glitch-ridden sequence of events". On April 17 North Korea's deputy United Nations ambassador accused the United States of "turning the Korean peninsula into "the world's biggest hotspot" and the North Korean government stated "its readiness to declare war on the United States if North Korean forces were to be attacked." President Donald Trump called Mr Kim "Little Rocket Man" and a "sick puppy", and promised that continued North Korean threats to America "will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen". President Trump has at times called diplomacy with the Kim regime "a waste of time". In reality on April 18, the Carl Vinson and its escorts were 3,500 miles from Korea engaged in scheduled joint Royal Australian Navy exercises in the Indian Ocean.  The Carl Vinson aircraft carrier had been in the South China Sea in 2015 and again in February 2017 on routine patrols. In late April 2017, Trump stated that "[t]here is a chance that we [the United States] could end up having a major, major conflict with North Korea". According to New York Times correspondent Michael S. Schmidt, Trump proposed using a nuclear weapon against North Korea and blaming the attack on another country, but was dissuaded by John F. Kelly. In July 2017, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson authorized a "Geographical Travel Restriction" which banned Americans from entering North Korea. On August 30, 2018, the ban was extended until August 31, 2019.

2017 detaining of US citizens

An American citizen by the name of Tony Kim, also known by the Korean name of Kim Sang-duk, was detained while attempting to leave North Korea through Pyongyang International Airport. In January 2016, an American student, Otto Warmbier, was detained at Pyongyang International Airport after allegedly attempting to steal a propaganda poster from his hotel. The other members of his tour group, which including several U.S. citizens, were allowed to leave without incident. Hotel security footage allegedly showed Warmbier going into a staff-only area of the hotel and removing the poster from the wall. In March 2016, he was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor, but in June 2017 was released from North Korea, having suspiciously fallen into a coma-like state. He died a few days after being repatriated to the U.S. North Korea claimed that they had nothing to do with his death. The China-based travel company that took Warmbier to North Korea as part of a tourist group stated that it would no longer accept U.S. citizens on its tours to avoid similar incidents. After Americans heard about Warmbier's death, 49% wanted the administration to act, while 35% did not. Of those Americans who wanted action to be taken, the most popular response was for the U.S. to tighten sanctions on North Korea, and the second most popular was a total travel ban between the two countries. United States military action was the least popular response.

Nuclear Intelligence Report
In August 2017, The Washington Post reported on a confidential assessment carried out by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency which suggested that North Korea had successfully developed nuclear warheads for missiles within reach of the US mainland. Reacting to the report President Trump stated that future threats would be "met with fire and fury and frankly power, the likes of which this world has never seen before." In response North Korea announced that it was examining an operational plan to strike areas around the U.S. territory of Guam in the Pacific, including the Andersen Air Force Base. Officials stated that Joseph Y. Yun, the US envoy for North Korea policy, and Pak Song-il, a senior North Korean diplomat at the country's UN mission, were making regular contact during this dispute, through a conduit of communication they called the New York channel.

Trump and UN member states on North Korea's threats
On August 8, 2017, President Trump suggested that the United States was prepared to inflict "fire and fury" against North Korea if they failed to cease nuclear testing and threats. In response, North Korea issued a series of threats against the U.S. territory of Guam as well as allies such as Japan and South Korea. Two missiles were flown over Japanese territory and a nuclear test was conducted.

In a speech to the United Nations General Assembly in September 2017, Trump threatened to "totally destroy" North Korea if the United States were "forced to defend itself or its allies"; he repeated his recent nickname for Kim Jong Un as "Rocket Man". In response North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called the speech "unprecedented rude nonsense" and "mentally deranged behaviour".

On September 23, 2017, the U.S. Military flew B-1B bombers from Guam, along with F-15C Eagle fighter escorts from Okinawa, Japan flew in international airspace over waters east of North Korea. Unlike on previous missions, the U.S. aircraft were not accompanied by South Korean or Japanese planes. Afterward North Korea said a missile strike against the U.S. is "inevitable all the more".

On September 30, 2017, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the U.S. and North Korea were in "direct contact", and "probing" the possibility of talks.

On October 9, 2017, US Air Force B-1 bombers carried out mock missile launches off both coasts of South Korea. Two bombers operating out of Andersen Air Force Base in Guam carried out the drills along with fighter jets from the South Korean and Japan militaries. This was the first nighttime B-1 bomber exercise between the three allies.

On November 28, 2017, North Korea fired an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and it was the first such launch from the rogue regime in more than two months. The missile, believed to be an ICBM by the U.S. Military, was launched from Sain Ni, North Korea and flew roughly 620 miles before landing in the Sea of Japan.

2018 Singapore Summit
On March 8, 2018, following a meeting with President Trump, South Korean diplomat Chung Eui-yong revealed that Kim Jong Un had expressed "eagerness" to meet with the President, and that his offer had been accepted, with a meeting proposed to take place before May. The move was described by South Korean President Moon Jae-in as a "miracle." The meeting had been scheduled to be held on June 12 in Singapore, although after military exercises between the United States and South Korea, Kim Jong Un threatened to pull out of the summit, and on May 24 President Trump cancelled it. On June 1, 2018, Trump announced that the summit was "back on" for June 12 in Singapore after meeting with North Korean officials at the White House. President Trump met with Chairman Kim on June 12. During the meeting, a historic agreement was signed between the two countries calling for North Korea to reaffirm its commitment to the 2017 Panmunjom Declaration signed between North and South Korean to work towards completely denuclearizing the entire Korean Peninsula. The agreement declared a new start to US-DPRK relations between the two countries to achieve "peace and prosperity" through cooperation on issues such as the recovery of POW/MIA remains. Trump subsequently announced that war game exercises between the US and South Korean militaries would end.

POW/MIA remains
Thousands of U.S. military personnel went missing during the Korean war. Between 1990 and 2018, North Korea returned the remains of 340 soldiers, but about 7,700 bodies were still unaccounted for. The June 12, 2018 summit between the US and North Korea included a vague agreement to begin repatriating American POW/MIA remains. One month later, North Korea returned 55 boxes to the US. They were accompanied by the military identification tag of only one person, but other servicemen could be identified through matching DNA, chest X-rays, and dental records. By October 2019, it was reported that 35–40 servicemen had been identified.

Aftermath
North Korea's state media declared a new era of peace following the summit. Reports emerged on June 23 that North Korea was removing anti-US propaganda.

On June 24, Trump stated that North Korea still posed an 'extraordinary threat' to the US and maintained sanctions on the country despite declaring them no longer a threat the day following the summit.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's first visit to North Korea in July 2018 invoked disgruntled remarks from Pyongyang that the Trump administration was using "unilateral and gangster-like demand for denuclearization". Pompeo maintained that the July talks were "productive". However, the International Atomic Energy Agency has since stated North Korea is continuing with their nuclear program, and Trump announced the cancellation of Secretary of State Pompeo's scheduled visit in August 2018 to North Korea due to insufficient progress in the dismantling of North Korea's nuclear weapons program.

Interactions between the Washington and Pyongyang continue to fluctuate following the September 2018 United Nations General Assembly. In his speech, President Trump commended Kim Jong-Un for ceasing nuclear testing, dismantling several military facilities, releasing American hostages, and returning POW/MIA remains. Trump reaffirmed that sanctions will continue to be held on North Korea until denuclearization occurs.

Assault on North Korean embassy in Spain
On February 22, 2019, at around 3 pm a group of 10 people carrying real or simulated weapons entered the North Korean embassy in Madrid, Spain. They rounded up the eight embassy staffers who were present, put bags on their heads, tied them up, beat several of them and interrogated them. They robbed mobile phones and computer drives. The assault lasted for two hours, until Spanish policemen entered the building and the attackers fled in two of the embassy's cars. On March 13, Spanish police and intelligence services identified two of the attackers as CIA operatives. The CIA denied any involvement.

2019 Hanoi Summit
The 2019 North Korea–United States Hanoi Summit was a two-day summit meeting between North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump, held in Vietnam on February 27–28, 2019. The leaders had intended to hold a signing ceremony on February 28, but the summit ended without a signed agreement. North Korea immediately resumed rebuilding its long-range rockets at its Sohae Launch Facility.

It was the second meeting between leaders of the North Korea and United States. It had been planned since the previous September, and its location and date was announced during President Trump's third State of the Union on February 5, 2019.

After the summit, President Trump said he believed North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's denial of personal knowledge about Otto Warmbier's treatment in North Korean custody. Trump contended that it was not to Kim's benefit to allow such abuse.

Plans for third summit and exchange of letters
On June 26, 2019, it was announced that talks were underway to hold a third US-North Korean summit. President Trump previously contended in April 2019 that a third summit "would be good," On June 12, 2019, President Trump announced that he received a letter from Kim Jong Un which he described as "beautiful". On June 22, 2019, an undated photo was also released by the North Korean government of Kim Jong Un reading a letter from President Trump. Kim described the letter as "excellent" and described President Trump as the "supreme leader" of the United States. However, Kim later denied that talks were still being held between North Korea and the United States, and relations still remained tense between North Korea and the US State Department.

2019 DMZ Summit

On June 30, 2019, President Trump met with Kim along with Moon Jae-in at the DMZ and briefly crossed the border line into the North Korean side of the DMZ, making him the first sitting U.S. president to enter North Korea; former US Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton had previously visited North Korea after they left office. After crossing into North Korea, Trump and Kim, who stated through an interpreter "it's good to see you again", "I never expected to meet you at this place" and "you are the first US President to cross the border," met and shook hands. Both men then briefly crossed the larger border line before crossing into South Korea. During their meeting, President Trump also invited Kim to the White House, although later acknowledged that it probably wouldn't happen in the near term.

It was also revealed that Trump's daughter Ivanka and her husband Jared Kushner had visited North Korea to meet with Kim beforehand and acted as lead American diplomats during the summit. Footage of Ivanka meeting with Kim was broadcast by the North Korean media. Ivanka also described her visit to North Korea as "surreal."

Later developments in 2019 and 2020
On September 10, 2019, Trump said he sacked National Security Adviser John Bolton as he strongly disagreed with Bolton's suggestion about applying Libyan model to North Korea. However, Bolton himself said he was not sacked but resigned. Trump selected hostage negotiator with DPRK Robert C. O'Brien as the new National Security Adviser.

Talks in Stockholm began on 5 October 2019 between US and North Korean negotiating teams. After one day, the North Koreans said that talks had broken down, blaming US inflexibility. The US team, however, said discussions were good, and would be resumed in two weeks. On October 7, 2019, North Korea's chief negotiator Kim Myong Gil cautioned about a "terrible" event that might take place if the U.S. did not offer a better deal to Pyongyang. He said that the ball is currently in U.S.' court to resume dialogue.

In December 2019, US Ambassador to the United Nations Kelly Craft said during a meeting of the UN Security Council that was called at her request that the US was prepared to take "simultaneous steps" with North Korea to achieve peace. But she also warned the North Koreans against conducting further missile tests.

In April 2020, U.S. Rewards for Justice Program offered $5 million for information leading to identify North Korean hackers threatening the United States.

As of May 2020, North Korea has shown no indication that it is willing to unilaterally denuclearize as per U.S. intentions.

On June 12, 2020, the two-year anniversary of the Singapore summit, the North Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs released a press statement that the Trump administration efforts in the past two years were for political achievements without returns for North Korea and "Nothing is more hypocritical than an empty promise." North Korea subsequently cut communications with South Korea, demolished the four-story joint-liaison office building it shared with South Korea on June 17, and ceased efforts for diplomatic relations with the United States.

In an article written in the Hankyoreh daily newspaper in July 2020, Moon Chung-in, Special Advisor to South Korean President Moon Jae-in, argues that the hardline approach of John Bolton and other US figures concerning North Korean disarmament will lead to eventual war, not peace. He believes a more effective approach towards North Korean denuclearization is for the two Koreas to work together economically until both sides depend on each other enough to be invested in each other's national security.

Biden administration (2021–)
In early 2021, the United States under the presidency of Joe Biden attempted a new outreach to North Korea, to which they were unresponsive. On 18 March, the Korean Central News Agency put out a statement by North Korean first vice minister of Foreign Affairs Choe Son-hui acknowledging attempts at contact, and stating that North Korea would continue to ignore such attempts in the future. In it, she also criticized the United States for continuing military drills and maintaining sanctions against North Korea, and said that "no dialogue would be possible until the United States rolled back its hostile policy toward North Korea and both parties were able to exchange words on an equal basis."

In October 2021, Kim Jong Un said the United States was a continuing source of hostility, and he made a public appearance in a showroom of advanced weapons. These weapons included one that Kim identified as a newly tested type of hypersonic missile that is difficult to shoot down; a new type of low-flying cruise missile; and what may be the world's largest, but still untested, intercontinental ballistic missile.

On February 26, 2022, North Korea's foreign ministry stated that the US measures that "disregard" Russian security concerns are a "root cause of the Ukrainian crisis," in its first remark since Moscow launched a military invasion of its neighbour days earlier.

On March 5, 2022, North Korea conducted its ninth weapons test of the year, shooting a suspected ballistic missile into the sea east of the Korean peninsula, just days before the presidential election in South Korea. The launch was met with condemnation from the US, South Korea, and Japan, which worry the North is planning a major nuclear test in the coming months.

On March 11, 2022, after North Korea launched elements of its largest intercontinental ballistic missile in two recent tests, the US Treasury Department imposed fresh penalties.

In May 2022, the United States and South Korea announced expanded military exercises, which according to South Korean military officials would involve field training for the first time since 2018. A North Korean foreign ministry-run think tank stated that these exercises will create "unprecedented instability security-wise."

Nuclear weapons
From January 1958 through 1991, the United States held nuclear weapons due to its diplomatic and military influence in South Korea for possible use against North Korea, peaking in number at some 950 warheads in 1967. Reports establish that these have since been removed but it has never confirmed by any independent 3rd party organization such as IAEA. The U.S. still maintains "the continuation of the extended deterrent offered by the U.S. nuclear umbrella".

In September 1956, the U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Radford told the U.S. Department of State that the U.S. military intention was to introduce atomic weapons into South Korea. In January 1957, the U.S. National Security Council began consideration of this proposal upon President Eisenhower's instruction, and then agreed to this. However, paragraph 13(d) of the Korean Armistice Agreement mandated that both sides should not introduce new types of weapons into South Korea, so preventing the introduction of nuclear weapons and missiles. The U.S. decided to unilaterally abrogate paragraph 13(d), breaking the Armistice Agreement, despite concerns by United Nations allies. At a June 21, 1957 meeting of the Military Armistice Commission the U.S. informed the North Korean representatives that the U.N. Command no longer considered itself bound by paragraph 13(d) of the armistice. In August 1957, NSC 5702/2 permitting the deployment of nuclear weapons in Korea was approved. In January 1958 nuclear armed Honest John missiles and 280mm atomic cannons were deployed to South Korea, a year later adding nuclear-armed Matador cruise missiles with the range to reach China and the Soviet Union.

North Korea denounced the abrogation of paragraph 13(d) as an attempt to wreck the armistice agreement and turn Korea into a U.S. atomic warfare zone. At the U.N. General Assembly in November 1957, the Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia condemned the decision of the United Nations Command to introduce nuclear weapons into Korea.

North Korea responded militarily by digging massive underground fortifications, and forwarded deployment of its conventional forces for a possible counterattack against the United States forces stationed in South Korea. In 1963, North Korea asked the Soviet Union for help in developing nuclear weapons, but was refused. However, instead the Soviet Union agreed to help North Korea develop a peaceful nuclear energy program, including the training of nuclear scientists. China later, after its nuclear tests, similarly rejected North Korean requests for help with developing nuclear weapons.

North Korea joined the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) as a non-nuclear weapons state in 1985, and North and South Korean talks begun in 1990 resulted in a 1992 Denuclearization Statement. However, US intelligence photos in early 1993 led the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to demand special inspection of the North's nuclear facilities, which prompted Kim Il Sung's March 1993 announcement of North Korea's withdrawal from the NPT. UN Security Council resolution 825 from May 11, 1993, urged North Korea to cooperate with the IAEA and to implement the 1992 North-South Denuclearization Statement. It also urged all member states to encourage North Korea to respond positively to this resolution and to facilitate a solution of the nuclear issue.

U.S.–North Korea talks began in June 1993 but with lack of progress in developing and implementing an agreement, North Koreans unloaded the core of a major nuclear reactor, which could have provided enough raw material for several nuclear weapons. With tensions high, Kim Il Sung invited former U.S. President Jimmy Carter to act as an intermediary. Carter accepted the invitation, but could only act as a private citizen not a government representative. Carter managed to bring the two states to the negotiating table, with Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs Robert Gallucci representing the United States and North Korean Vice Foreign Minister Kang Sok-ju representing his country.

The negotiators successfully reached the U.S.–North Korea Agreed Framework in October 1994:
 * North Korea agreed to freeze its existing plutonium enrichment program, to be monitored by the IAEA;
 * Both sides agreed to cooperate to replace North Korea's graphite-moderated reactors with light water reactor (LWR) power plants, to be financed and supplied by an international consortium (later identified as the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization or KEDO) by a target date of 2003;
 * The United States and North Korea agreed to work together to store safely the spent fuel from the five-megawatt reactor and dispose of it in a safe manner that does not involve reprocessing in North Korea;
 * The United States agreed to provide shipments of heavy fuel oil to provide energy in the meantime;
 * The two sides agreed to move toward full normalization of political and economic relations;
 * Both sides agreed to work together for peace and security on a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula; and
 * Both sides agreed to work together to strengthen the international nuclear non-proliferation regime.

Historians Paul Lauren, Gordon Craig, and Alexander George point out that the agreement suffered from a number of weaknesses. There was no specific schedule made for reciprocal moves, and the United States was granted a very long time to fulfill its obligations to replace the dangerous graphite-moderated reactors with LWRs. Furthermore, no organization was chosen "to monitor compliance, to supervise implementation ... or to make mid-course adjustments that might become necessary." Finally, other interested nations, like South Korea, China, and Japan, were not included in the negotiations.

Soon after the agreement was signed, U.S. Congress control changed to the Republican Party, who did not support the agreement. Some Republican senators were strongly against the agreement, regarding it as appeasement.

In accordance with the terms of the Agreed Framework, North Korea decided to freeze its nuclear program and cooperate with United States and IAEA verification efforts, and in January 1995 the U.S. eased economic sanctions against North Korea. Initially U.S. Department of Defense emergency funds not under Congress control were used to fund the transitional oil supplies under the agreement, together with international funding. From 1996 Congress provided funding, though not always sufficient amounts. Consequently, some of the agreed transitional oil supplies were delivered late. KEDO's first director, Stephen W. Bosworth, later commented "The Agreed Framework was a political orphan within two weeks after its signature".

In January 1995, as called for in the Agreed Framework, the United States and North Korea negotiated a method to safely store the spent fuel from the five-megawatt reactor. According to this method, U.S. and North Korean operators would work together to can the spent fuel and store the canisters in the spent fuel pond. Actual canning began in 1995. In April 2000, canning of all accessible spent fuel rods and rod fragments was declared complete.

North Korea agreed to accept the decisions of KEDO, the financier and supplier of the LWRs, with respect to provision of the reactors. International funding for the LWR replacement power plants had to be sought. Formal invitations to bid were not issued until 1998, by which time the delays were infuriating North Korea. In May 1998, North Korea warned it would restart nuclear research if the U.S. could not install the LWR. KEDO subsequently identified Sinpo as the LWR project site, and a formal ground breaking was held on the site on August 21, 1997. In December 1999, KEDO and the (South) Korea Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO) signed the Turnkey Contract (TKC), permitting full scale construction of the LWRs, but significant spending on the LWR project did not commence until 2000.

In 1998, the United States identified an underground site in Kumchang-ni, which it suspected of being nuclear-related following a Defense Intelligence Agency assessment. In March 1999, North Korea agreed to grant the U.S. "satisfactory access" to the site. The U.S. inspection in spring 1999 showed that the Defense Intelligence Agency assessment was wrong. In October 2000, during Special Envoy Jo Myong Rok's visit to Washington, and after two visits to the site by teams of U.S. experts, the U.S. announced in a Joint Communiqué with North Korea that U.S. concerns about the site had been resolved.

As called for in Dr. William Perry's official review of U.S. policy toward North Korea, the United States and North Korea launched new negotiations in May 2000 called the Agreed Framework Implementation Talks.

George W. Bush announced his opposition to the Agreed Framework during his candidacy in the 2000 United States presidential election. Following his inauguration in January 2001, the new administration began a review of its policy toward North Korea. At the conclusion of that review, the administration announced on June 6, 2001, that it had decided to pursue continued dialogue with North Korea on the full range of issues of concern to the administration, including North Korea's conventional force posture, missile development and export programs, human rights practices, and humanitarian issues. As of that time, the Light Water Reactors (LWRs) promised in the Agreed Framework had not been delivered. The two reactors were finally supplied by the Swiss-based company ABB in 2000 in a $200 million deal. The ABB contract was to deliver equipment and services for two nuclear power stations at Kumho, on North Korea's east coast. Donald Rumsfeld, the US secretary of defense, was on the board of ABB when it won this deal, but a Pentagon spokeswoman, Victoria Clarke, said that Rumsfeld does not recall it being brought before the board at any time. Construction of these reactors was eventually suspended.

In 2002 the US Government announced that it would release $95m to North Korea as part of the Agreed Framework. In releasing the funding, President George W Bush waived the Framework's requirement that North Korea allow inspectors to ensure it has not hidden away any weapons-grade plutonium from the original reactors. President Bush argued that the decision was "vital to the national security interests of the United States".

In 2002, the administration asserted that North Korea was developing a uranium enrichment program for nuclear weapons purposes. American-DPRK tensions mounted when Bush categorized North Korea as part of the "Axis of Evil" in his 2002 State of the Union address.

When U.S.-DPRK direct dialogue resumed in October 2002, this uranium-enrichment program was high on the U.S. agenda. North Korean officials acknowledged to a U.S. delegation, headed by Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs James A. Kelly, the existence of the uranium enrichment program. Such a program violated North Korea's obligations under the NPT and its commitments in the 1992 North-South Denuclearization Declaration and the 1994 Agreed Framework. The U.S. side stated that North Korea would have to terminate the program before any further progress could be made in U.S.-DPRK relations. The U.S. side also claimed that if this program was verifiably eliminated, the U.S. would be prepared to work with DPRK on the development of a fundamentally new relationship. In November 2002, the members of KEDO agreed to suspend heavy fuel oil shipments to North Korea pending a resolution of the nuclear dispute.

Following Kim Jong-il's death on December 17, 2011, his son Kim Jong Un inherited the regime. The latter announced on February 29, 2012, that North Korea will freeze nuclear tests, long-range missile launches, and uranium enrichment at its Yongbyon plant. In addition, the new leader invited international nuclear inspectors who were ejected in 2009. The Obama administration responded by offering 240,000 tonnes of food, chiefly in the form of biscuits. This indicated a softening of the west regarding North Korea's insistence that food aid must comprise grains.

In late 2002 and early 2003, North Korea terminated the freeze on its existing plutonium-based nuclear facilities, expelled IAEA inspectors and removed seals and monitoring equipment, quit the NPT, and resumed reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel to extract plutonium for weapons purposes. North Korea subsequently announced that it was taking these steps to provide itself with a deterrent force in the face of U.S. threats and the U.S.'s "hostile policy". Beginning in mid-2003, the North repeatedly claimed to have completed reprocessing of the spent fuel rods previously frozen at Yongbyon and lain cooperation with North Korea's neighbors, who have also expressed concern over the threat to regional stability and security they believe it poses. The Bush administration's stated goal is the complete, verifiable, and irreversible elimination of North Korea's nuclear weapons program. North Korea's neighbors have joined the United States in supporting a nuclear weapons-free Korean Peninsula. U.S. actions, however, had been much more hostile to normalized relations with North Korea, and the administration continued to suggest regime change as a primary goal. The Bush administration had consistently resisted two-party talks with the DPRK. A September 2005 agreement took place only after the Chinese government threatened to publicly accuse the U.S. of refusal to engage in negotiations.

Six-party talks
In early 2003, multilateral talks were proposed to be held among the six most relevant parties aimed at reaching a settlement through diplomatic means. North Korea initially opposed such a process, maintaining that the nuclear dispute was purely a bilateral matter between themselves and the United States. However, under pressure from its neighbors and with the active involvement of China, North Korea agreed to preliminary three-party talks with China and the United States in Beijing in April 2003.

After this meeting, North Korea then agreed to six-party talks, between the United States, North Korea, South Korea, China, Japan, and Russia. The first round of talks were held in August 2003, with subsequent rounds being held at regular intervals. After 13 months of freezing talks between the fifth round's first and second phases, North Korea returned to the talks. This behavior was in retaliation for the US's action of freezing offshore North Korean bank accounts in Macau. In early 2005, the US government told its East Asia allies that Pyongyang had exported nuclear material to Libya. This backfired when Asian allies discovered that the US government had concealed the involvement of Pakistan; a key U.S. ally was the weapon's middle man. In March 2005, Condoleezza Rice had to travel to East Asia in an effort to repair the damage.

The third phase of the fifth round of talks held on February 8, 2007, concluded with a landmark action-for-action agreement. Goodwill by all sides has led to the US unfreezing all of the North Korean assets on March 19, 2007.

As of October 11, 2008, North Korea has agreed to all U.S. nuclear inspection demands, and the Bush administration responded by removing North Korea from a terrorism blacklist despite the American government threatening to end negotiations.

Resurgence of hostilities
Starting in late August 2008, North Korea allegedly resumed its nuclear activities at the Yongbyon nuclear facility, apparently moving equipment and nuclear supplies back onto the facility grounds. Since then, North Korean activity at the facility has steadily increased, with North Korea threatening Yongbyon's possible reactivation.

North Korea has argued that the U.S. has failed to fulfill its promises in the disarmament process, having not removed the country from its "State Sponsors of Terrorism" list or sent the promised aid to the country. The U.S. has recently stated that it will not remove the North from its list until it has affirmed that North Korea will push forward with its continued disarmament. North Korea has since barred IAEA inspectors from the Yongbyon site, and the South has claimed that the North is pushing for the manufacture of a nuclear warhead. The North has recently conducted tests on short-range missiles. The U.S. is encouraging the resumption of six-party talks.

Removal from terror list
On October 11, 2008, the U.S. and North Korea secured an agreement in which North Korea agreed to resume disarmament of its nuclear program and once again allowed inspectors to conduct forensic tests of its available nuclear materials. The North also agreed to provide full details on its long-rumored uranium program. These latest developments culminated in North Korea's long-awaited removal from America's "State Sponsors of Terrorism" list on the same day.

2006
U.S. intelligence agencies confirmed that a test occurred. Tony Snow, President George W. Bush's White House Press Secretary, said that the United States would go to the United Nations to determine "what our next steps should be in response to this very serious step." On Monday, October 9, 2006, President Bush stated in a televised speech that such a claim of a test is a "provocative act" and the U.S. condemns such acts. President Bush stated that the United States is "committed to diplomacy" but will "continue to protect America and America's interests." The Six-Party Talks, below, resulted.

2009
On May 25, 2009, American-North Korean relations further deteriorated when North Korea conducted yet another nuclear test, the first since the 2006 test. The test was once again conducted underground and exploded with a yield comparable to the Little Boy and Fat Man bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki, respectively. The United States reacted favorably to China and Russia's reactions, who condemned North Korea's actions even though they are both strong allies of North Korea. The U.S., along with all other members of the stalled six-party talks, strongly condemned the test and said that North Korea would "pay a price for its actions." The U.S. also strongly condemned the subsequent series of short-range missile tests that have followed the detonation.

2013
On January 24, 2013, officials in North Korea openly stated that they intended to plan out a third nuclear test. A written statement from the National Defence Commission of North Korea stated "a nuclear test of higher level will target against the U.S., the sworn enemy of the Korean people." The United States intelligence community believes that, as of January 2013, North Korea has the capability to target Hawaii with its current technology and resources, and could reach the contiguous United States within three years. The White House has declared the Korean statement as "needlessly provocative" and that "further provocations would only increase Pyongyang's isolation." Analysis of satellite photos done by the U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies of the Punggye-ri nuclear test site indicates that North Korea was readying for nuclear tests at the same time it issued the threat. Later statements by North Korea included direct threats against South Korea as well, stating that North Korea "will take strong physical counter-measures against" the South in response to UN sanctions against the North. A Gallup poll that was done in 2013 revealed that, "Americans (55%) said the U.S. should defend South Korea if it was attacked by its northern neighbor, while about a third (34%) said it should not."

On February 12, 2013, North Korea conducted a third nuclear test.

2016
On January 6, 2016, North Korea conducted a fourth nuclear test. North Korean officials also announced that North Korean scientists have miniaturized nuclear weapons.

In February 2016, President Barack Obama enacted the North Korea Sanctions and Policy Enhancement Act of 2016, which passed the House of Representatives and the Senate with nearly unanimous support. The Inquisitr reported: "In February, President Obama hit North Korea with a round of congressionally approved sanctions that severely limits the growth of the North Korean economy, a move that China criticized, stating that the sanctions could cripple North Korea's economy."

Public opinion on North Korea
During Donald Trump's presidency, he and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un have exchanged insults on numerous occasions. Trump often took to Twitter to talk about Kim Jong Un and the current North Korea situation. The situation had seriously elevated, worrying many Americans. A portion of Americans (22%) thought that North Korea posed a serious threat to the United States, while 60% of Americans thought it was no threat at all. Many Americans have shown doubt and sometimes outright opposition to then-President Trump during the crisis. A plurality of Americans believed Trump lacked the responsibility to handle the North Korea situation, and many had more trust in U.S. military leaders than they did in Trump. Still, many Americans seemed to be unsure on who they are more comfortable with handling the situation. Americans are still hesitant of military action, as a majority of Americans still oppose preemptive military intervention. Top people within the military and government see this situation escalating to military action, while some still have hope that peace is possible. Still, the U.S. continues to impose sanctions on North Korea.

Q: How much do you trust Donald Trump to act responsibly in handling the situation involving North Korea – a great deal, a good amount, just some or not at all?

Q: How much do you trust North Korean leader Kim Jong Un to act responsibly in handling the situation involving North Korea – a great deal, a good amount, just some or not at all?

Q: How much do you trust U.S. military leaders to act responsibly in handling the situation involving North Korea – a great deal, a good amount, just some or not at all?

Q: To try to get North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons, would you support or oppose the U.S. offering North Korea financial incentives such as aid money, or more trade?

Q: To try to get North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons, would you support or oppose the U.S. bombing North Korean military targets?

Q: To try to get North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons, would you support or oppose the U.S. agreeing to stop conducting U.S. military exercises with South Korea?

Q: In general, should the U.S. (launch a military strike on North Korea first, before it can attack America or U.S. allies) or should the U.S. (only attack North Korea if it attacks America or U.S. allies)?

Q: If the U.S. launched a military strike on North Korea first, do you think it would or would not risk starting a larger war in East Asia? IF RISK: Do you think that would be a major risk; or a risk, but not major? (Results by all adults)

However, although Americans are inclined to defensive and/or pacifist positions against North Korea, the Global Attitudes Survey conducted by the Pew Research Center in the spring of 2017 suggests how a majority of Americans (64%) expects U.S. military intervention if one of its Pacific allies (particularly Japan and South Korea) were to come into military conflict with North Korea. In contrast, the survey points to how 30% of Americans are opposed to such interventionism. In both a parallel and comparative perspective, a majority of South Korean and Japanese citizens (91% and 82% respectively) also expect U.S. military intervention if their country was attacked by North Korea.

In 2023, North Korea's state newspaper Rodong Sinmun reported that approximately 800,000 students and employees nationwide voiced an interest in joining or reenlisting in the military to fight against the United States on Friday (17 March).

title: North Korea–United States relations


text:
Strife (1996 video game)

Strife (also known as Strife: Quest for the Sigil) is a first-person shooter role-playing video game developed by Rogue Entertainment. It was released in May 1996 in North America by Velocity Inc. and in Europe by Studio 3DO. The shareware version was released on February 23, 1996, while the full version was released on May 3. It was the last commercially released standalone PC game to utilize the id Tech 1 engine from id Software. The plot takes place in a world taken over by a religious organization known as "The Order"; the protagonist, an unnamed mercenary (sometimes referred to as Strifeguy), becomes a member of the resistance movement which aims to topple the Order's oppressive rule.

Strife added some role-playing game elements to the classic first-person shooter formula, such as allowing players to talk to other characters in the game's world or improve the protagonist's abilities. Contemporary reviews praised these innovations and the story, but also criticized the quality of the graphics and the obsolete engine. Years after its release, the game was retrospectively considered to have been underappreciated in its day, and described as a precursor to games such as Deus Ex.

An enhanced version of the game, Strife: Veteran Edition (also dubbed The Original Strife: Veteran Edition) was developed and published by Night Dive Studios and released on Steam on December 12, 2014. Veteran Edition was also released on Nintendo Switch and Amazon Luna on October 25, 2020 and September 29, 2022, respectively.

Gameplay
Strife's gameplay is standard for the first-person shooter genre; the action is observed from the protagonist's viewpoint, and most of the game involves combat with the Order's infantry and war robots. The main character begins with just a dagger, but more powerful weapons, such as a crossbow or a flamethrower can be found throughout the game. The protagonist also has an inventory where he can keep items for later use, such as first aid kits for healing, protective armor, or gold coins.

The game contains numerous friendly or neutral characters with whom the player can converse or trade. These characters often assign the player character missions, thus advancing the plot. If the player fires a weapon while not in a combat situation, it usually sets off an alarm and makes the guards attack the protagonist; however, certain weapons – the dagger and poisonous crossbow bolts – allow attacking enemies stealthily without activating the alarm.

Unlike most other first-person shooters of the time, Strife does not follow a linear series of levels. Instead, the town of Tarnhill acts as a central hub from which the player can travel back and forth between various areas, which stay the same as they were when the player left them.

The player character has two numerical attributes, accuracy and stamina, which can be improved at certain points in the game. The first attribute increases the accuracy of ranged weapons, while the latter increases the maximum amount of health.

Plot
The game is set some time after a catastrophic comet impact, which brought a deadly virus onto the planet. In the resulting plague, millions of people died, while other victims became mutated and began hearing the voice of a malevolent deity. They formed an organization called "The Order" and enslaved the rest of the populace, but a rag-tag resistance movement, called "The Front", is trying to topple The Order's reign.

The unnamed protagonist of the game is a wandering mercenary, captured by Order troops near the town of Tarnhill. After killing the guards and escaping, he meets a man named Rowan, who makes him an offer to join the Front. The protagonist receives a communication device through which he remains in contact with a female member of the Front, codenamed Blackbird. From then on, Blackbird provides assistance and commentary throughout the game. The protagonist heads to the Front's base, where the rebel leader, Macil, sends him on a number of missions in order to weaken the Order. After several acts of sabotage, the Front proceeds to assault the Order's castle. The protagonist, accompanying them in the attack, kills a major member of the Order called "The Programmer". He loses consciousness upon touching the weapon that the Programmer had been using.

The mercenary wakes up in the castle, now taken over by the Front. Macil explains that the Programmer's weapon is one of the five fragments of the "Sigil", a powerful weapon worshipped by the Order. He orders the protagonist to find the remaining four. To this end, the mercenary visits a knowledgeable being called "The Oracle", who reveals that the next fragment is being held by another of the Order's leaders, The Bishop. After killing the Bishop and acquiring the second fragment, the protagonist returns to the Oracle, only to be told that the third fragment is being held by Macil himself; the Oracle claims that Macil is a traitor who has been using the protagonist as a pawn in his scheme. At this point, the player must make a decision: either disbelieve the Oracle and kill it, or trust the Oracle and kill Macil. This choice affects the rest of the story.

If the player trusts Macil and kills the Oracle (acquiring a Sigil fragment it was holding), he receives another task from Macil: to deactivate a factory, built on the comet's impact site, where the Order is turning captured people into "bio-mechanical soldiers". Upon completing his mission, the protagonist learns that Macil has gone insane; he returns to the base and attempts to speak to Macil, who declares in his madness that he wishes to free the "one god", then attacks the protagonist. Upon killing Macil, the protagonist obtains his Sigil fragment. He then returns to the factory, where lies the laboratory of the Loremaster, another of the Order's leaders. After killing Loremaster and thus acquiring the final Sigil piece, he uses the Sigil to unlock a door leading to the comet's impact site. Inside, he finds an extraterrestrial spaceship. Within the ship waits an alien being known as "The Entity"; it is the one responsible for creating the Order and taking over the minds of mutated people. The mercenary kills it with the Sigil; its death means the end of the Order. He then finally meets Blackbird face to face. She tells him that his victory allowed mankind to create a vaccine for the virus, then kisses him.

The plot takes a different direction if the player decides to trust the Oracle and immediately kill Macil. Once he does so (claiming Macil's Sigil piece in the process), the Oracle dispatches him to the Loremaster's laboratory. Having killed the Loremaster and obtained his fragment of the Sigil, the protagonist returns to the Oracle, who then reveals that it was using him all along in a bid to acquire the complete Sigil, use it to free the "one god", and attain eternal life. The mercenary kills the Oracle and, with all five fragments of the Sigil now in his possession, heads to the alien ship. There he encounters the Entity, but the being speaks with Blackbird's voice, and implies that it was manipulating the protagonist throughout the game in order to regain freedom and take over the planet. After killing the Entity, the ending sequence is shown, this time less optimistic: the cure for the virus has not been invented and mankind's future is uncertain.

Development
Strife was originally being developed by Cygnus Studios, the creators of Raptor: Call of the Shadows, for id Software. Cygnus Studios was already working on another first-person shooter role-playing game, The Second Sword, utilizing the older ShadowCaster game engine by id Software. id Software asked Cygnus Studios to create a game based on the Doom engine and requested that the studio be relocated to Texas from Chicago while they were still developing Raptor so that they would be able to develop the new title for id Software. The studio agreed and after relocating, the studio no longer wanted to work on The Second Sword and the title was dropped in favor of working on Strife.

Cygnus Studios worked on Strife for a few months following Raptor being finished. However, internal conflicts soon arose and employees split off from Scott Host, the original founder of Cygnus Studios, and he re-located back to Chicago and Strife was essentially cancelled. This group of employees then founded Rogue Entertainment and resumed development on Strife. The shareware version was released on February 23, 1996, while the full version was released on May 31. It was the last commercially released standalone PC game to utilize the id Tech 1 engine from id Software.

Community support
After the game's official support ended, game engine recreations of Strife were created by Doom source port developers through reverse engineering. Notably authors were Jānis Legzdiņš (author of the Doom source port Vavoom), Randy Heit (author of ZDoom), Samuel Villarreal (author of SvStrife), and James Haley (author with Samuel Villareal of Chocolate Strife). Except for the last, these allow for high resolution graphics modes, better mouselook, and expanded modding capabilities.

Strife was ported to the Amiga in 2013.

Digital re-release
In 2014 Night Dive Studios coordinated the digital re-release of Strife as Strife: Veteran Edition (or The Original Strife: Veteran Edition), after acquiring rights to the game. Because the game's source code had been lost by Rogue Entertainment, a derivative of the Chocolate Doom subproject Chocolate Strife was used as the game's engine, with its original programmers being contracted to do additional coding for the re-release. The source code of Strife: Veteran Edition was made available under GNU GPL-2.0-or-later on github.com. The enhanced version of the game was released as Strife: Veteran Edition by Night Dive Studios on Steam on December 12, 2014. Veteran Edition was subsequently released for Nintendo Switch on October 25, 2020, and for Amazon Luna on September 29, 2022.

Reception
Strife received quite positive reviews upon its release. Reviewers took note of the novel gameplay: unlike most previous first-person shooters, such as Doom, the player must cooperate with friendly characters in Strife, while killing everyone in sight ends badly. Some reviews praised the story, but the reviewer in Next Generation criticized it for being too linear and the choices being illusionary.

The voice-acting in the game was generally rated positively; in particular, the voice and personality of Blackbird was praised by some reviewers, with GameSpot's Tal Blevins describing her voice as "sexy".

Strife's graphics were overall rated poorly. The reviewers criticized the game for using the obsolete Doom engine, which they considered especially jarring when compared to more modern games such as Duke Nukem 3D or Quake. However, the hand-drawn illustrations which appear during dialogues and cutscenes were generally considered to be of good quality. Some reviewers doubted the novelty of the gameplay, pointing out that similar ideas were already used in e.g. CyberMage: Darklight Awakening. Limiting the player to a single savegame slot was also criticized, especially since making a wrong decision could make the game unwinnable.

Years after its release, retrospective reviews of the game were more positive. The reviewer of jeuxvideo.com recommended Strife for first-person shooter fans. Two articles about the game were published on the PC Gamer website. Richard Cobbett described the game in his "Saturday Crapshoot" series; he considered Strife to be an underappreciated game, but believed that it had not aged well. Paul Dean likewise concluded that Strife did not receive the attention it deserved back in its day, and encouraged readers to play the game. Both journalists compared Strife to the later Deus Ex, a more commercially successful attempt to combine the first-person shooter formula with role-playing elements.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Strife (1996 video game)


text:
Steve Caballero

Steve Caballero (born November 8, 1964) is an American professional skateboarder. He is known for the difficult tricks and air variations he invented for vertical skating and for setting the long-standing record for the highest air achieved on a halfpipe. In 1999, Thrasher Magazine named Caballero the "Skater of the Century".

Career
Caballero was born with scoliosis, a condition which causes a curvature of the spine, although he has stated that the condition "really hasn't affected me too much."

He began skating in 1976 at the age of 12 and started his career at age 14. His first sponsor was Campbell Skate Park. In 1979, Caballero entered a national skate contest in Escondido. After finishing fifth place, he was approached by Stacy Peralta who offered him sponsorship with Powell Peralta. He turned pro in 1980 during the Gold Cup series at the Oasis Skatepark, Southern California. By this time, Caballero had invented the 'Caballerial' (also known as 'Cab'), a skateboarding trick also known as the fakie 360 aerial. Caballero is also credited with inventing the frontside boardslide.

In 1987, Caballero won both street and vert titles at the World Championships in Münster, Germany. The same year, on September 7, 1987, he set the world record for highest air achieved on a half-pipe by successfully executing an eleven-foot backside air at the Raging Waters Ramp in San Jose, California. Caballero's record was later beaten by Danny Way in 1997. In 1999, Caballero set another record for the longest board slide on a 44 step handrail.

Caballero is a member of the Bones Brigade, and has appeared in many of their videos, including The Search for Animal Chin. His current sponsors include Powell Peralta, Bones Bearings, Independent Truck Company, Bones Wheels, Vans Skate Shoes, 187 killer pads, Merge4 socks, and Protec Helmets. His past sponsors included Tracker Trucks, Standard Trucks, and Red Dragon Apparel.

During the first half of the 1980s, Caballero was arguably the best professional skater and featured on the cover of Thrasher Magazine several times. He also features as a character in five of the Tony Hawk video games, from Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 to Tony Hawk's Underground, and as a downloadable skater in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD. Caballero's most recent video game appearance was in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 + 2, a remake of the first two games in the Tony Hawk series.

Caballero featured in Stacy Peralta's 2012 documentary film, Bones Brigade: An Autobiography, which chronicles the life stories of members of the Bones Brigade skate team such as Tony Hawk, Rodney Mullen, Mike McGill, Lance Mountain and Tommy Guerrero.

Other projects
He has been a member of several punk bands including The Faction, Odd Man Out, Shovelhead, and Soda, and released a compilation CD of the various bands he has appeared in, titled Bandology, through Sessions Records. The Faction's song "Skate And Destroy" featured on the soundtrack of Powell Peralta's eponymous Bones Brigade Video Show. He also had an acting role as Juan in the 1984 Jimmy McNichol action movie Escape from El Diablo, together with fellow skateboarder Mike McGill. In the 1980s, Caballero published a skate zine entitled 'SPEED ZINE,' which replaced 'Skate Punk,' an earlier zine that he discontinued, in part, because he "didn't like the name anymore."

Caballero also paints, collects toys and comic books, rides motocross, and is a hot rod enthusiast.

Caballero started a new punk band called Urethane, who has signed to the Cyber Tracks record label. Their debut album, ‘Chasing Horizons’, was released on September 24, 2021.

Personal life
Caballero is of Japanese and Mexican descent, and is a Christian. Caballero was raised Catholic but now attends a non-denominational Christian church in Carlsbad, California named Daybreak since 2005.

Contest history
• 2nd in 1979 Winchester Open, San Jose.

• 1st in 1980 Gold Cup Contest at Upland Skatepark: Pool

• 3rd in 1980 Gold Cup Series Overall Results: Pools and Bowls

• 1st in 1980 Lakewood Half Pipe Contest: Vert

• 2nd in 1981 Skate City, Whittier Contest: Pool

• 1st in 1981 The Ranch Spring Nationals Contest, Doubles (with Eric Grisham): Pool

• 1st in 1981 Kona/Variflex Summer Nationals Contest: Vert

• 2nd in 1981 Pro Contest at Del Mar: Pool

• 2nd in 1981 Lakewood Contest: Pool

• 1st in 1982 Pamona World Challenge Pro Contest at San Francisco

• 1st in 1982 Summit V Open Ramp Contest at Nor-Cal: Highest Air and Consecutive Airs

• 2nd in 1982 Summit V Open Ramp Contest at Nor-Cal: Add-On Competition

• 4th in 1982 Pipeline Christmas Classic Contest at Upland Skatepark: Pool

• 1st in 1983 Great Desert Ramp Battle Contest: Vert

• 2nd in 1983 Spring Nationals Contest at Del Mar: Pool

• 3rd in 1983 San Francisco Street Style Contest: Street

• 1st in 1983 Joe's Ramp Jam: Vert

• 1st in 1983 Summer World Series at Upland Skatepark: Pool

• 1st in 1983 Kona/Variflex Summer Nationals Contest: Vert

• 2nd in 1983 Summer World Series at Del Mar: Pool

• 1st in 1983 Summer World Series at Del Mar, Doubles (with Lance Mountain): Pool

• 2nd in 1983 Turkey Shoot Contest at Upland Skatepark: Pool

• 3rd in 1983 Shut Up and Skate Contest at the Clown Ramp in Dallas, Texas: Vert

• 2nd in 1984 Sundek Pro Skateboard Challenge at Kona Skatepark, Florida: Vert

• 1st in 1984 NSA Summer Olympic Series at Golden Gate Park, San Francisco: Street

• 1st in 1984 NSA Summer Series at Upland Skatepark: Pool

• 1st in 1984 NSA Summer Series at Upland, Doubles (with Lance Mountain): Pool

• 1st in 1984 Eagle Rock Ramp Contest at Los Angeles: Vert

• 1st in 1984 Embarcadero Street Style Contest at San Diego: Street

• 1st in 1984 Capitola Classic Street Style Contest: Street

• 3rd in 1984 Huntington Beach World Open Pro Contest: Street

• 3rd in 1985 Sacramento Street Style Contest: Street

• 3rd in 1985 NSA/Variflex Rage at Badlands Contest at Upland Skatepark: Pool

• 3rd in 1985 NSA Rap Up at the Skate Ranch at Del Mar: Pool

• 4th in 1985 Capitola Classic Street Style Contest: Street

• 3rd in 1986 NSA Contest at Del Mar: Pool

• 1st in 1986 Sacramento Street Style Contest: Street

• 1st in 1986 Go Skate Sacramento Pro Contest: Vert

• 4th in 1986 East Coast Assault Contest at Virginia Beach, Mount Trashmore: Vert

• 1st in 1986 Oceanside Street Attack Contest: Street

• 1st in 1986 NSA Expo 86 (Vancouver, BC): Pool

• 3rd in 1986 NSA Expo 86 (Vancouver, BC): Vert

• 2nd in 1986 NSA Chicago Blowout Contest: Vert

• 3rd in 1986 NSA Bare Cover Pro/Am Contest in Tempe, AZ: Vert

• 2nd in 1986 NSA Pro Finals at Anaheim Convention Center: Vert

• 4th in 1987 NSA VP Fair Pro Championship Contest at St. Louis Contest: Vert

• 2nd in 1987 Thrasher Savannah Slamma I Contest: Street

• 1st in 1987 Titus World Cup Contest at Muenster, Germany: Vert

• 1st in 1987 Titus World Cup Contest at Muenster, Germany: Street

• 1st in 1987 Raging Waters' Boomer Ramp Contest in San Jose, CA: Highest Air

• 1st in 1988 Thrasher Savannah Slamma II Contest: Street

• 1st in 1988 Raging Waters' Boomer Ramp Contest in San Jose, CA: Longest Rail Slide

• 2nd in 1988 Raging Waters' Boomer Ramp Contest in San Jose, CA: Lip Trick Contest

• 3rd in 1988 Airwalk Skate Fest Contest at Toronto, Canada: Vert

• 1st in 1988 Tracker Bluegrass Aggression Session at Freedom Hall, Louisville: Street

• 1st in 1988 Titus World Cup Contest at Muenster, Germany: Street

• 2nd in 1988 Titus World Cup Contest at Muenster, Germany: Vert

• 3rd in 1988 Capitol Burnout at the Sacramento Raceway: Mini Ramp

• 3rd in 1988 Torquay Ramp Riot II at Torquay, Australia: Vert

• 6th in 1988 NSA Pro Street Style Contest at Pride Pavilion, Phoenix St.: Street

• 1st in 1989 NSA Pacific Mini Ramp Challenge at Honolulu, Hawai: Mini Ramp

• 5th in 1989 NSA Chicago Shootout Pro Street Style Contest: Street

• 9th in 1989 NSA Vans Jam Contest: Vert

• 7th in 1989 NSA Pro Finals at St. Pete, Florida: Street

• 4th in 1989 NSA Pro Finals at St. Pete, Florida: Vert

• 5th in 1990 NSA Street Style Shootout Contest at Honolulu, Hawai: Street

• 5th in 1990 NSA Backyard Series at Visalla, California: Vert

• 3rd in 1990 NSA Pro Mini Ramp Contest at San Jose: Mini Ramp

• 1st in 1991 NSA North of the Border Contest at Santa Ana: Vert

• 6th in 1991 NSA Pow Wow Street Style Contest at Powell Peralta's Skatezone: Street

• 2nd in 1991 NSA Capitol Burnout Contest at Sacramento, California: Vert

• 6th in 1991 Titus World Cup Contest at Muenster, Germany: Street

• 3rd in 1991 Titus World Cup Contest at Muenster, Germany: Vert

• 1st in 1991 Holy Masters Skate Contest at Le Grand Bornand, France: Highest Air

• 2nd in 1991 Holy Masters Skate Contest at Le Grand Bornand, France: Vert

• 4th in 1991 Holy Masters Skate Contest at Le Grand Bornand, France: Street

• 3rd in 1991 NSA Mini Ramp Contest at San Jose: Vert

• 3rd in 1992 NSA Pow Wow Street Style Contest at Powell Peralta's Skatezone: Street

• 9th in 1992 PSL Transitions Pro Street Contest at Los Angeles: Street

• 2nd in 1992 PSL Pro Contest at San Jose Skatepark: Street

• 9th in 1993 NSA Pro Finals Fat City Jam Daily Grind at Sacramento, California: Vert

• 5th in 1994 Pro Street Style Contest at Vancouver, BC: Street

• 6th in 1995 X Games at Newport, Rhode Island: Street

• 9th in 1999 X Games at Pier 30 & 32, San Francisco, California: Street All contest results are covered in Thrasher Magazine and can be checked at the Thrasher Magazine Archives.

title: Steve Caballero


text:
Talk:Sidereal day

I just made the year a sidereal year. That changes the sidereal day slightly, according to the following calculation:

86400000 3652564 3662564 */ . 86164099 ok 86400000 3652422 3662422 */. 86164090 ok

phma

pronounciation
side-real or sigh-der-ial? 86.128.51.192 20:30, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

I believe it is pronounced as "sigh-dear-ee-uhl"

tropical day and sidereal day
Hello all of you,

The idea of Sidereal day is related to the rotation of the earth with relation to the stars (so when the mean star is in median) 23.934472 Hours, correct? The Solar day is the day related to the mean sun (very close to 24.0000 Hours). Beside this two days another 'Days' exists: a Day of 24 Hours (Hour is defined by using atomic time) and I think this "Day" is the length one refers to when say e.g. that the sun takes 365.24218962 DAYS. Correct?

We also have the pure mean rotational duration of the earth, so the mean time it takes to rotate 360 degrees looking at its own axis. I call this the Tropical day and it is 23.9344697 Hours long. The relation between Sidereal day and Tropical day is the luni-solar precession (25,770 Years) [ precession ]

Are the above deduction correct? And one question is related to the mean Sidereal day. It refers to "the hour angle of the vernal equinox" in Explanatory Supplement to the Astronomical Almanac (p. 48). THAT would say that the Sidereal day has nothing to do with the stars... I don't understand this... I am investigating this for my web-site: http://www.iol.ie/~geniet/eng/moonfluct.htm (where all durations are seen as 'mean')

Can someone help me here?

All the best,

Victor

 * (William M. Connolley 16:50, 2004 Apr 21 (UTC)) Not sure... I think tropical day is probably equinox-to-equinox.

vernal equinox is not a physical object ?
Previously the article said "An apparent sidereal day is the time it takes for the Earth to turn 360 degrees in its rotation; more precisely, is the time it takes the vernal equinox to make two successive upper meridian transits. ... Midnight, in sidereal time, is when the vernal equinox crosses the upper meridian."

That doesn't make any sense to me. The vernal equinox is a point in time (near March 21), not a physical object that can cross the meridian.

I changed it to say

"An apparent sidereal day is the time it takes for the Earth to turn 360 degrees in its rotation; more precisely, is the time it takes a typical star to make two successive upper meridian transits."

Is "a typical star" OK, or is there some subtlety I'm missing ?

-- DavidCary 06:01, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

To answer your question, yes the vernal equinox is a point in time, more specifically the day when the sun crosses the celestial equator going north. That event happens in the same location on the celestial sphere every time it happens. That point is where Right Ascension is by definition 0 hours. Probably because it wasn't given any other name 0h RA is commonly called the vernal equinox. The use of "typical star" is perfectly alright, but the transit of the vernal equinox is when the sidereal day begins.

Starfoxy 14:28, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)

"There are 366.2422 sidereal days in a tropical year, but 365.2422 solar days"

Am I missing something or is that a typo? I might be missing something but I'd take that to mean they're 1.0000 days apart

Solar day vs sidereal day:
I am still not clear on this: how does one actually measure a sidereal day ? Is it by using a star other than the sun as a reference point ? Is the point of this that there is a discrepancy between the results of that versus using the sun as a reference point ?

Obviously, the solar day will vary between latitudes and times of the year, but if you add up all the solar days in a year, don't they average out to the same as a sidereal year ?

I am trying to grasp this, I really am! Thanks, Omega Man 01:25, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Just a note - did a small edit since somebody had vandalized the photo description. TR

 * a sidereal day is simply how long it takes for a planet to spin on it's axis one full rotation. I don't like the fact that they call it an apparent sidereal day. A solar day is how long it takes the sun to reach the same position in the sky. This is variable because not only does it take into account the fact that the earth is rotating, but it's also revolving, therefor the solar day isn't the same ... every day. Imaslee  pviking  ( talk ) 20:11, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

title: Talk:Sidereal day