Final Preparations for Trump/Kim Summit.
BLITZER: Time to prepare is running out. We're less there and two weeks away from the summit involving the North Korean leader, and the president of the United States. CNN's military and diplomatic analyst, retired Rear Admiral John Kirby, has a closer look at the uphill battle.</s>REAR ADM. JOHN KIRBY, CNN MILITARY & DIPLOMATIC ANALYST (voice-over): After weeks of whipsawing and mutual threats to cancelling, administration officials are now in the final stages of turning President Trump's surprise decision to meet North Korea's leader, Kim Jong-Un, into a reality. It's no small feat preparing for one of the most consequential summits since the end of the Cold War, especially now, with little time left to go, a nervous China, an unpredictable leader in Pyongyang, and a president who tends to veer off script.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: President Trump thinks he's the only one that has the negotiation kills, the toughness, the audacity to reach an agreement with North Korea.</s>KIRBY: Since the announcement, the president near completely turned over his national security team, changing up the secretary of state, the CIA director and national security adviser all in a matter of weeks. In normal circumstances, lower-level staffers from both countries would spend months negotiating, hammering out all the details before the leaders meet. In this case, the president is working backwards, agreeing to a summit first with the topics and logistics to come later. It makes the hastily planned meeting even more challenging to pull together.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: From a logistical standpoint, we'll need to move in a motorcade, a communications set, all kinds of things to create an atmosphere that allows the president to continue governing from a security standpoint. We'll need to have our Secret Service prepare for every contingency imaginable. And from a substance standpoint, the goal is to shrink the margin of error about less ambiguity about what will happen when the two leaders meet.</s>KIRBY: President Trump has before him an historic opportunity to do what no other president has done before, convince the North Koreans to give up its nuclear weapons program. While Kim Jong-Un has signaled that he's willing to commit to a full denuclearization of the peninsula, it's not at all clear what that means to Kim Jong-Un or what he wants in return.</s>MADELIENE ALBRIGHT, FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE: I don't think he means complete denuclearization. I think he's looking at something phased, certainly that has a payoff, a one for one, and also what the verification aspects are going to be. The president has to be prepared to push them on what the definitions of issues are and not just say, great, you're going to get rid of your nukes. That's not what is going to happen.</s>KIRBY (on camera): But experts argue Kim may already have what he wants, recognition by the United States and a meeting with the president, while giving up what he would have stopped up anyway.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Kim Jong-Un has to fund three things simultaneously. The nuclear missile program, his security services and also the elite who keep him in power and prop him up. If the financial spigot gets tightened enough, he won't have enough money to fund all three simultaneously, and he'll have to make choices. And that hard choice could be to suspend nuclear missile testing because it's very expensive.</s>KIRBY (voice-over): Kim is maximizing leverage ahead of the summit, making trips to China, launching a charm offensive on South Korea, and releasing three American detainees back to the United States. President Trump can rightly claim some credit to getting us to this point, but it's the perceived lack of preparation by the U.S. and the president's tendency to improvise that has experts worried.</s>ALBRIGHT: The North Koreans are smart and well prepared. Certainly, when I was there, Kim Jong-Il, the father, was very well briefed on things. I think it would be very dangerous to improvise with them. I think it's very important to be disciplined.</s>KIRBY: John Kirby, CNN, Washington, D.C.</s>BLITZER: Thanks, John, for that report. We're standing by. Kim Yong Chol, the former North Korean spy chief, he is going to be meeting with this secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, the former CIA director, in New York. That's the next stage in the development of this possible summit, still scheduled for June 12th in Singapore. It would be the highest-ranking meeting between a president of the United States and the leader of North Korea. A really historic moment if in fact it still takes place. Clearly, both of these leaders want it to take place. We'll see if it does. The meeting's in New York between the North Korean spy chief and Mike Pompeo. Certainly will set the scene. That's it for me. Thanks very much for watching. I'm Wolf Blitzer. The news continues right now.