PANMUNJOM, South Korea (AP) — U. S. Vice President Mike Pence declared Monday the “era of strategic patience is over” with North Korea, expressing impatience with the speed and willingness of the regime to move toward ridding itself of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.
PANMUNJOM, South Korea (AP) — U. S. Vice President Mike Pence declared Monday the “era of strategic patience is over” with North Korea, expressing impatience with the speed and willingness of the regime to move toward ridding itself of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.
Pence told reporters near the Demilitarized Zone separating North and South Korea that President Donald Trump is hopeful that China will use its “extraordinary levers” to pressure the North to abandon its weapons.
Pence, who has called the North’s failed missile test a day earlier “a provocation, ” said the U. S. and its allies will achieve its objectives through “peaceable means or ultimately by whatever means are necessary” to protect South Korea and stabilize the region.
Pence visited a military base near the DMZ, Camp Bonifas, for a briefing with military leaders and to meet with American troops stationed there. The joint U. S.-South Korean military camp is just outside the 2.5-mile-wide DMZ.
His visit, full of Cold War symbolism, and his remarks to reporters come amid increasing tensions and heated rhetoric on the Korean Peninsula. While the North did not conduct a nuclear test, the specter of a potential escalated U. S. response trailed Pence as he began a 10-day trip to Asia.
Pointing to the quarter-century since North Korea first obtained nuclear weapons, the vice president said a period of patience followed.
“But the era of strategic patience is over, ” Pence said. “President Trump has made it clear that the patience of the United States and our allies in this region has run out and we want to see change.
