Status quo 1 of several options on N. Korea

missiles — or even the Kim regime itself through a coup or uprising — in exchange for controlling the future of North Korea. That would likely mean not allowing a democratic, free, Westernized and unified Korean peninsula on its borders.

Other than disassociating itself from the future status of North Korea, the U.S. should ensure that it does not give any concessions to China to remove the nukes. Such an indulgence would only reward North Korea nuclear roguery and ensure that the cycle of the last three decades would be endlessly repeated.

3. Forced removal. Barring acceptance of the status quo or a Chinese solution, the U.S. would be forced to accept widespread malnutrition of the North Korean populace and a constant ratcheting up of pressures to eliminate Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons.

Such leverage might include radical bilateral trade sanctions against China. The Japanese, Taiwanese and South Korean militaries could threaten to go nuclear.

The U.S. should sponsor a Manhattan Project-style regional comprehensive missile defense system. It could also ban Chinese Communist Party officials and their families from U.S. soil.

Such pressures might force something quite unpredictable to happen.

4. Preemption. Barring the “peaceful” options of defanging nuclear North Korea, the U.S. and its Japanese and South Korean allies would have to disable the missiles through military force.

Such action would have to include massive attacks on North Korean missile sites, command and control centers, artillery and missile platforms, military bases and WMD repositories.

Such preemption would quickly escalate to a general-theater war — or worse.

The U.S. and its allies would win such a war. But the cost could be catastrophic and prompt global recession.

One thing is always certain. The naive architects of appeasement who watch as monsters grow always win short-term praise for avoiding immediate war. Their realist successors, who are forced to cage or destroy such full-grown beasts, are usually labeled as war mongers.