North Korea:
President Trump continues threatening tweets, saying U.S. forces are “locked and loaded.”
WASHINGTON — U.S. tensions with North Korea took another turn Friday morning when President Trump opted to again highlight the threat the U.S. military could pose to Pyongyang, tweeting that “military solutions are now fully in place” and “locked and loaded” should North Korea “act unwisely.” But his next act on Twitter suggests that despite the bellicose rhetoric, the Pentagon is not on the brink of war.
Trump retweeted a message from U.S. Pacific Command that said supersonic B-1B bombers on Guam were “ready to fulfill USFK’s #FightTonight mission if called upon to do so.”
That message, including the dramatic hashtag, may sound ominous to the uninitiated. But combined with comments Thursday from Defense Secretary James Mattis and decades of history between North Korea and the United States, it suggests that while the present situation between Pyongyang and Washington is quite serious, Pacific Command is more signaling its readiness to fight if need be than spoiling for a battle within days.
The Air Force has kept bombers on Guam for years, and the Pentagon and U.S. Forces Korea — the USFK referenced in Pacific Command’s tweet — have long used the “fight tonight” motto in South Korea to reflect the seriousness of their mission. More than 29,000 U.S. troops are stationed in South Korea, and at least 28,500 have been there each year since an armistice agreement put a halt to fighting in the Korean War in 1953.
Former presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush — who included North Korea with Iran and Iraq in his “Axis of Evil” — also both used the “fight tonight” phrase while discussing North Korea.
Trump’s actions Friday morning came after Mattis again tamped down talk of war during an appearance Thursday.
“What I would say here, ladies and gentlemen —” Mattis responded, before stopping for a full five seconds to collect his thoughts. “My portfolio, my mission, my responsibilities is to have military options should they be needed.”
But the Pentagon chief quickly added that the American effort against North Korea was diplomatically led by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, and gaining diplomatic traction and results.
“I want to stay right there right now,” Mattis said. “The tragedy of war is well enough known. It doesn’t need another characterization beyond the fact that it would be catastrophic.”