On the anniversary of Korea’s Liberation Day, President Lee Jae Myung reaffirmed his government’s desire for peaceful coexistence with North Korea. For the past year, Lee’s government has endeavored to restore diplomatic engagement with Pyongyang through reassurance of its commitment to ending mutual hostility, disavowing unification by absorption, and mutual respect for each other’s political systems. Though likely not coordinated with Seoul, U.S. President Donald Trump also drew media attention this month by expressing similar sentiment in favor of peaceful engagement with Kim Jong-un’s regime. Reducing the scale of the recent Korea-U.S. military exercise in August, Trump repeated his claim that he has a good relationship with the North Korean leader and said he planned to meet with Kim later this year. Much of the news speculation and analysis since then has been on whether Pyongyang would respond to Seoul and Washington’s overtures. My puzzle, however, is on the ultimate objective of the diplomatic engagement. Even if a peaceful coexistence is achieved with Pyongyang, i