Is the US preparing for war against North Korea?
13 March 2017
A dangerous confrontation is rapidly emerging on the Korean Peninsula between the United States and North Korea, with the potential to plunge North East Asia and the rest of the world into a catastrophic conflict between nuclear-armed powers.
Amid a barrage of commentary in the American and international media inflating the threat posed by the Pyongyang regime, the Trump administration is actively considering “all options” to disarm and subordinate North Korea.
The immediate pretext is North Korea’s test-firing of four medium-range ballistic missiles last week, following the launch in February of a new intermediate-range missile. However, the drumbeat of US military threats has been preceded by months of high-level discussions in American foreign policy and military circles over action to prevent North Korea building an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of hitting the continental United States.
President Barack Obama, who, according to the New York Times, was considering the most extreme measures against Pyongyang, urged then-President-elect Donald Trump to make North Korea his highest security priority. Since taking office, the Trump administration has been conducting a top-level review of US strategy toward Pyongyang, considering every option, including, as a White House official told the Wall Street Journal, those “well outside the mainstream” such as “regime-change” and military strikes on North Korean nuclear facilities and military assets.
A worried New York Times editorial last week, headlined “Rising Tensions with North Korea,” underscored the dangers of war breaking out in North East Asia. “How Mr. Trump intends to handle this brewing crisis is unclear, but he has…