Editor's note:  Brian Becker, an executive director of the ANSWER Coalition.  And this article reflects the author's opinions and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

In what appears to be a last-ditch effort to rescue U.S.-DPRK negotiations before the 2020 U.S. election cycle goes into full swing and just days before the Pyongyang's announced end-of-the-year deadline for progress in negotiations, White House special envoy Stephen Beguin arrived in Seoul, South Korea and publicly appealed to the DPRK leadership with the words "Let's get this done." 

Beguin's visit to South Korea to restart the stalled nuclear negotiations came just one day after the DPRK announced that it conducted a second major missile test within one week at the Sohae Satellite Launching Ground. 

Pyongyang had promised to dismantle the Sohae test site during the heady days following the signing of the Singapore summit declaration by Donald Trump and DPRK leader Kim Jong Un in June 2018. 

The euphoria that followed the Singapore summit meeting came to a crashing end on the second day of the follow-up summit that took place in Hanoi on February 27-28 when President Trump offered the DPRK a take-it-or-leave it demand to give up its entire nuclear arsenal in exchange for the future lifting of economic sanctions by the United States. 

It is noteworthy that Stephen Biegun, who had publicly accepted the DPRK's negotiating stance of incrementalism and reciprocity, had been pushed to the back bench on the second day of the Hanoi Summit and replaced by notorious anti-DPRK hawk John Bolton, who was then the National Security Advisor to Trump. 

Under Bolton's stewardship the terms abruptly changed at the Hanoi Summit and Pyongyang was offered a "deal" that Bolton knew they would never accept. 

Bolton was later fired by Trump who said of Bolton "We were set back very badly when John Bolton talked about the Libyan model [for the DPRK]" and he said Bolton was a "disaster" for negotiations. 

The big question now is whether Stephen Biegun has the authority inside the Trump administration to take steps the DPRK will consider meaningful and serious on the issue they consider most important: will there be a formal change in U.S. attitude towards its relations with the DPRK. 

For Pyongyang the issue of improving U.S.-DPRK relations and ending the state of war that has continued since the signing of the 1953 armistice takes precedence over all other questions and provides the necessary context for the possibility of nuclear disarmament or nuclear reduction on the Korean peninsula. 

This was codified in the language and the ordering of the Singapore declaration signed by Trump and Kim. Point #1 read: "The United States and the DPRK commit to establish new U.S.–DPRK relations in accordance with the desire of the peoples of the two countries for peace and prosperity." 

Nuclear disarmament appears as the third point in the declaration. Stephen Biegun publicly embraced this concept as the foundation for the negotiations prior to the Hanoi summit. He knows that this actually serves as the path to peace. 

The question now is whether Biegun can deliver on the promise of the Singapore Summit and whether he has any remaining credibility with the DPRK, which is prepared to resume advanced missile testing as a means of securing a deterrent in a potential confrontation with the United States.