On July 4, 2017, North Korea announced that it had conducted its first test of an intercontinental ballistic missile, and that the test had been successful. US officials have forecasted that the missile has a range of 3,400 miles, capable of reaching Alaska. In response, President Donald Trump scolded North Korea for the missile tests, saying that the country is “behaving in a very, very dangerous manner.”
Today, in a news conference with Polish President Andrzej Duda in Warsaw, Trump stated: “It’s a shame they’re behaving this way — they’re behaving in a very, very dangerous manner and something will have to be done about it.”
Trump announced that the US would tackle the North Korean threat head on, but noted that he would not draw a red line. “I have some pretty severe things that we’re thinking about,” he said, “but that doesn’t mean we’re going to do them.” Despite being a bold statement by the President, he refused to elaborate any further.
On Wednesday, the United Nations Security Council called for a special meeting. Trump’s comments came after Nikki Haley, the US Ambassador to the UN, stated at the meeting that military action was on the table in response to the test. “The US is prepared to use the full range of our capabilities to defend ourselves and our allies,” Haley said. However, she did add that the US would “prefer not” to use armed forces. “One of our capabilities lies with our considerable military forces. We will use them, if we must, but we prefer not to have to go in that direction.” In a call to action, she asked China to use its economic influence over North Korea to control the leadership of King Jong Un.
James Bays of Al Jazeera has stated that this issue will be most definitely be a topic of discussion later this week when Trump meets with world leaders in Germany. “Expect a bit of a difficult meeting with China’s President Xi Jinping because President Trump has put a lot of his eggs in the China basket in dealing with North Korea.” Back in April, when Trump hosted Xi at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, all looked good between the two countries. However, that might not be the case now since Trump has certainly been tweeting that China has not been doing enough to put pressure on North Korea.
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