The Trump administration is applying a “peaceful pressure campaign” on North Korea, the heads of the Defense and State departments wrote in an op-ed on Sunday, The Hill reports.
Lawmakers in both parties raised concerns that President Donald Trump’s rhetoric on North Korea over the past week exacerbated an already delicate situation, and the op-ed appears to be an attempt to tamp down the heated rhetoric.
“While diplomacy is our preferred means of changing North Korea’s course of action, it is backed by military options. The U.S. is willing to negotiate with Pyongyang,” wrote Defense Secretary James Mattis and State Department Secretary Rex Tillerson in the op-ed, which was published by The Wall Street Journal.
The Trump administration’s approach, they argued, is a replacement for past administrations “failed policy of ‘strategic patience’ which expedited the North Korean threat”. They call the approach “strategic accountability”.
The op-ed also emphasizes China’s role in pressuring North Korea to decelerate its nuclear program. “Our diplomatic approach is shared by many nations supporting our goals, including China, which has dominant economic leverage over Pyongyang. This affords China an unparalleled opportunity to assert its influence with the regime,” according to the op-ed.
Trump has previously said he is “disappointed” China does nothing but “talk” on North Korea and urged the country to do more to halt North Korea’s rapidly advancing nuclear program. The United Nations, unanimously, with support from China, recently adopted new sanctions against North Korea.
“The region and world need and expect China to do more,” according to the op-ed, which calls China’s UN vote “a step in the right direction”.
North Korea responded to the new UN sanctions with increased aggression, escalating last Wednesday to a threat to attack waters near the U.S. territory of Guam. Last week, Trump issued stern warnings about the U.S. response to North Korea, saying the United States will respond with “fire, fury and frankly power” to such threats.
On Friday he tweeted that the military is “locked and loaded” and that North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un would “truly regret it” if he attacks the U.S. territory of Guam.
“Hopefully it will all work out. Nobody loves a peaceful solution more than President Trump, that I can tell you…But we will see what happens. We think that lots of good things could happen, and we could also have a bad solution.” he said later in the day.
The op-ed emphasizes that “any attack will be defeated, and any use of nuclear weapons will be met with an effective and overwhelming response” to North Korea.
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