WASHINGTON \u2014 A day after the U.S. secretary of state warned of military action against North Korea if it does not negotiate to relinquish its nuclear weapons, several U.S. lawmakers exhorted that even limited strikes would provoke a catastrophic war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Following reports the Trump administration is weighing limited, pre-emptive \u201cbloody nose\u201d attacks to rid Pyongyang of its nuclear program, two Iraq veterans in Congress want the administration to drop the idea \u2014 and for President Trump to curb his fiery rhetoric.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pyongyang, could within hours of being attacked, kill hundreds of thousands of South Koreans and Americans in Seoul and the surrounding areas before allies could suppress North Korea artillery, they said. From there, there would be tens of thousands dead per day, for weeks and months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSo there\u2019s no such thing as a limited strike, whether or not you use a nuclear cruise missile,\u201d said Illinois Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth. \u201cYou will have massive, massive noncombatant injuries, casualties, as well as military casualties.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cA lot of Americans don\u2019t understand that, and I don\u2019t think the president understands that from the way he tweets,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Duckworth and Arizona Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego spoke with reporters Wednesday, after their five-day trip to South Korea and Japan, where they met with top military and civilian officials from those countries and U.S. military officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
U.S. and allied military forces are ready, but the emphasis needs to be on diplomacy and sanctions, they said. \u201cContinuing to move those forward and deescalation of provocative words and acts by President Trump would be helpful, and continued pressure on Russia and China to fully implement our sanctions regime,\u201d Gallego said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking separately at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, Sen. Lindsey Graham \u2014 a South Carolina Republican who golfs with and advises the president \u2014 said he was \u201c100 percent confident\u201d Trump would go to war against North Korea as a \u201clast resort.\u201d He cautioned Pyongyang\u2019s quest for a long-range nuclear weapon is making a confrontation ever more likely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI know there are some red lines in the president\u2019s\u2019 mind,\u201d said Graham, a retired military lawyer and member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. \u201cI know there are some red lines that our intel community believes exist. I\u2019m certainly not going to share them publicly, but this is not an ill-conceived idea. When that moment comes is when their program matures and goes across these red lines.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
North Korea claims to have successfully tested a new type of intercontinental ballistic missile capable of striking the U.S. mainland, but it has yet to show it has a nuclear warhead capable of surviving reentry into the Earth\u2019s atmosphere. Still, Graham worried North Korea might share technology to abet nuclear terrorism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Graham, too, dismissed the idea of an American surgical strike, but said the U.S. must maintain the threat of military force to deny North Korea\u2019s ability to hit America, and to convince China \u2014 which doesn\u2019t want a U.S.-North Korea war \u2014 to maintain pressure on Pyongyang.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIf China really believes Trump would use military force coming from North Korea, I believe they would change their behavior,\u201d Graham said. \u201cThey own the North Korean economy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There should be no illusions of an easy U.S. military operation against North Korea, Graham said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think you can surgically strike North Korea,\u201d Graham said. \u201cWhen I say the military option is the last resort, I mean it, because thousands of people can be killed.\u201d
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After a meeting of U.S. allies Tuesday on how to beef up the sanctions pressure, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson stressed that the Trump administration seeks a diplomatic resolution in the nuclear standoff, but he said the North has yet to show itself to be a \u201ccredible negotiating partner.\u201d He said U.S.-North Korea talks would require a \u201csustained cessation\u201d of threatening behavior.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe all need to be very sober and clear-eyed about the current situation,\u201d Tillerson said when he was asked whether Americans should be concerned about the possibility of a war. He said North Korea has continued to make significant advances in its nuclear weapons through the thermonuclear test and progress in its intercontinental missile systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe have to recognize that the threat is growing and that if North Korea does not choose the pathway of engagement, discussion, negotiation then they themselves will trigger an option,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A day after the U.S. secretary of state warned of military action against North Korea, if it does not negotiate to relinquish its nuclear weapons, several U.S. lawmakers exhorted that even limited strikes would provoke a catastrophic war.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":114795,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":86,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[15,86],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3431],"class_list":["post-135860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-pentagon-congress"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"BKYMAJECGFGEXMZW3353TCMZLM","arc_canonical_url":"\/congress\/2018\/01\/18\/us-lawmakers-bloody-nose-strike-would-spark-massive-war\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n