During a visit to London and the House of Commons, former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton told officials the CIA has warned the US President America could soon be within striking distance from Pyongyang missiles, according to the Guardian.
The March deadline, was also mentioned to a former European parliamentarian by a senior US commander a few days ago at Panmunjom on Korea’s demilitarised zone, which separates the North from the South.
Mr Bolton, who served under George W Bush, has recently been giving a series of warnings during appearances on US TV networks.
During an interview on Fox News at the end of last month, he warned that diplomatic options were running out after North Korea fired a new kind of intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and Kim claimed the Hwasong-15 can be armed with a nuclear warhead and could strike the United States mainland.
Getty/EPA
CIA heads have told Donald Trump he has a three month window to stop Kim Jong-un’s missile programme
Mr Bolton said this test-launch was “significant” because, if the early estimates are confirmed, it leaves no doubt that Pyongyang is “getting very close” to being able to threaten the US with a nuclear attack.
He said: ”You have to ask when we’re going to start seriously considering a military option.
“There is no time for this [sanctions] to have impact. Look, if the State Department is still focused on sanctions, then I will guarantee you. I’ll bet the ranch right now North Korea will have deliverable nuclear weapons.
“The one diplomatic play that’s left here is with China. Presumably, the president delivered that message, which should be something like, Look Xi Jinping, we can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way.
‘Donald Trump’ and ‘Kim Jong-un’ face-off amid North Korea nuclear threat
Sun, November 19, 2017
About 700 demonstrators protested in Berlin, Germany against the current escalation of threat of nuclear attack between the United States of America and North Korea
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An activist pretends to punch another wearing a mask of U.S. President Donald Trump next to a model of a nuclear rocket
“China has a unique capability to bring that regime in North Korea down, to reunite the two Koreas, to put in a new regime, to get rid of the nuclear weapons, but there isn’t any time to talk to North Korea about it, because they will use additional time to cross the nuclear finish line.
“And so that’s why I say, do you want a North Korea that has that capability, that can be a one-stop shopping place for thermo-nuclear weapons, ballistic technology for Iran and for ISIS, for any would-be nuclear state around the world, or would we take the obviously undesirable but potentially necessary step of using military force?”
The willingness of China to get fully embroiled in the stand-off between the US and North Korea has been questioned by Professor Steve Tsang, the director of the China Institute at the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), who told Express.co.uk that China had no reason to get involved.
He said: “Chinese leader Xi Jinping has no incentive to do it. The Chinese policy is simply to contain the problem over North Korea, not to resolve it.
AFP
North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un
“But why would they want to do that? How would it look within China if they Chinese were to cripple the North Korean economy and bring them to heel and bow to the Americans then the Communist party would be seen to have done the dirty on behalf of the United States.”
Mr Bolton also gave a pessimistic view of US diplomatic efforts over the years to halt North Korean military ambitions, saying efforts had simply failed.
He said: “We have blinked at this reality for 25 years. We’ve spent 25 years trying to talk or pressure the North Koreans into giving up. It has failed, and it will fail now this close to achieving what they’ve been after all those years.
“You have to ask when we’re going to start seriously considering a military option, because we’re going to come to a binary choice here.”
AFP
Donald Trump has been told by the CIA there is a three month window to stop Kim’s missile plans
North Korea described the latest military exercises between South Korea and the US, which involves hundreds of aircraft and started this week, as “grave provocation,” claiming in its state-run media Monday that they could escalate the situation “to the brink of nuclear war.”
Vigilant Ace he annual military drills come amid heightened tensions in the region triggered by Kim Jong Un’s missile and nuclear tests and the ratcheting up of rhetoric from both sides.
A total of 230 planes will fly from eight locations in South Korea, the Air Force said in a statement and will include two dozen US stealth jets.
Pyongyang said Vigilant Ace was being staged at a time “when insane President Trump is running wild” and it also condemned South Korea as “puppet war maniacs.”