Sunday during a special broadcast of Fox News Channel’s “Special Report,” Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer reacted to comments made by President Donald Trump in an interview that had aired earlier of Fox News regarding how the United States should deal with a nuclear North Korea.
Trump had told FNC’s Jeanine Pirro he had “good thoughts” on how to handle the situation, but was not going to reveal them. Krauthammer seemed to indicate to host Bret Baier that “thoughts” were not enough and that action needed to be taken.
The action Krauthammer suggested was the United States endorsing Japan or South Korea procuring nuclear weapons. That he argued would get the attention of China and force them to deal with the North Korean problem.
“We don’t know what the good thoughts are and they may be great thoughts,” Krauthammer said. “But we need some action. So far, we’ve seen what looks like a campaign of pressure, but it seems as if the president is putting almost all his eggs in the basket of the Chinese, who have never shown good faith in squeezing North Korea. I go back to what I’ve recommended now for years — you want to get the attention of the Chinese? Declared that the U.S. is quite prepared to look favorably upon a Japanese and South Korean nuclear deterrent. That will get the attention of the Chinese. Their worst nightmare is a nuclear Japan. Japan does not want to go nuclear. But there would be nothing like that to make the Chinese actually do something.”
“This would be an earthquake, but we’ve been waiting now 20 years, and we don’t have a lot of time,” he added. “People don’t understand. The North Koreans are racing to develop an ICBM that can hit us, and we don’t have a lot of time. The fuse has burnt.”
Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.