Funny thing about that is they did negotiate on it, and then the US started fucking with them even harder in the exact same way they did with Iran over its deals about nuclear energy and refinement. It's only at that point that the DPRK doubled down on actually achieving it ASAP and really came to understand that even post Cold War the US could not be negotiated with because any deal they struck would just be ignored by the US anyways.

[–] Carl@hexbear.net 15 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Famously they negotiated a nuclear deal with Clinton that would have replaced their home grown and weaponized nuclear industry with an internationally monitored peaceful use only one, but when Clinton brought that deal back to Congress they refused to ratify it. From 96 to 03 they tried to keep it alive but George W killed it more or less when he was declaring the DPRK part of the "axis of evil". From then on the DPRK has been pretty single minded about pursuing nukes and that shift has been proven right by every other country the US signed a nuclear deal with getting screwed over.