After North Korea Threatens New Missile Launch, Trump Says ‘Only One Thing Will Work’

After North Korea Threatens New Missile Launch, Trump Says ‘Only One Thing Will Work’
President Donald Trump at Liberty National Golf Club in New Jersey on Oct. 1, 2017. Trump said that he will do what has to be done when it comes to North Korea. (Rob Carr/Getty Images)
Jasper Fakkert
10/7/2017
Updated:
10/7/2017

A day after North Korea threats emerged to conduct a new ballistic missile launch, President Donald Trump wrote on Twitter that only one thing will work.

“Presidents and their administrations have been talking to North Korea for 25 years, agreements made and massive amounts of money paid ... hasn’t worked, agreements violated before the ink was dry, makings fools of U.S. negotiators,” Trump wrote on Twitter on Oct. 7.

He added that “Sorry, but only one thing will work!”.

On Friday, a Russian delegation that had visited North Korea this week said they were told by North Korean officials that they were planning a new missile launch.

The delegation also said they were shown calculations by the regime to prove that their missiles can reach the U.S. mainland.

A launch test of North Korea’s intermediate-range ballistic missile Hwasong-12 at an undisclosed location near Pyongyang, in a photo released by North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency on Aug. 30, 2017. (STR/AFP/GETTY IMAGES)
A launch test of North Korea’s intermediate-range ballistic missile Hwasong-12 at an undisclosed location near Pyongyang, in a photo released by North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency on Aug. 30, 2017. (STR/AFP/GETTY IMAGES)

“They are preparing for new tests of a long-range missile. They even gave us mathematical calculations that they believe prove that their missile can hit the west coast of the United States,” said Russian lawmaker Anton Morozov, a member of the Russian lower house of parliament’s international affairs committee.

“As far as we understand, they intend to launch one more long-range missile in the near future. And in general, their mood is rather belligerent,” he said.

Earlier this week, a top CIA official for the Korean Peninsula, said that the United States is expecting some new provocation from Kim on Oct. 10.

“I told my own staff October 10 is the Korean Workers Party founding day, that’s Tuesday in North Korea, but that’s Monday, Columbus Day holiday in the U.S., so stand by your phones,” Yong Suk Lee, deputy assistant director of the CIA’s Korea Mission Center, told students and reporters at George Washington University.

President Trump has been a strong critic of failed efforts by previous administrations to prevent North Korea from obtaining nuclear weapons.

“Rocket man should have been handled a long time ago,” Trump said, referring to North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un during a speech in Alabama last month. “He should have been handled a long time ago by [Bill] Clinton.”

“This shouldn’t be handled now—but I’m going to handle it, because we have to handle it,” Trump said.

Defense Secretary James Mattis (L) and Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, arrive to speak to the press about the situation in North Korea, at the White House in Washington on Sept. 3, 2017. (NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images)
Defense Secretary James Mattis (L) and Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, arrive to speak to the press about the situation in North Korea, at the White House in Washington on Sept. 3, 2017. (NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images)

President Bill Clinton reached an agreement with the North Korean regime in 1994 that provided it with aid and two light-water nuclear reactors in exchange for an end to its nuclear weapons program.

North Korea eventually broke the agreement and conducted its first underground nuclear test in 2006. It has conducted five more nuclear tests since, the most recent one in early September.

Analysts say that Kim Jong Un has sped up the North’s weapons program since coming to power in 2011, conducting as many as 85 ballistic missile tests since then.

Nuclear Test Over Pacific?

North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho announced last month while visiting New York for the UN General Assembly that his country intends to conduct a nuclear test over the Pacific Ocean.

The statement has put U.S. military leaders on high alert. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Joseph Dunford warned last week that such a test would create a nuclear disaster similar to the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in the Soviet Union in the 1980s.

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and other communist officials at an undisclosed location in North Korea in this picture released by North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency. (Korean Central News Agency)
North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and other communist officials at an undisclosed location in North Korea in this picture released by North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency. (Korean Central News Agency)

Concerns have been made worse by the fact that a missile containing a nuclear test weapon would most likely fly over Japanese airspace making the risk of a nuclear disaster even greater.

The U.S. announced earlier this week that it approved the selling of advanced missile defense systems to Japan. Japan’s defense minister, however, has said that his country does not intend to shoot down North Korean test missiles as that might be perceived as an act of war.
North Korea itself has stepped up threats on the United States and its allies in the region in recent weeks. On Saturday, North Korean state media said in an article that the U.S. and its close ally South Korea “will face total destruction.”
Jasper Fakkert is the Editor-in-chief of the U.S. editions of The Epoch Times. He holds a Bachelor's degree in Communication Science and a Master's degree in Journalism. Twitter: @JasperFakkert
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