Four years ago, for example, the DIA said it believed with "moderate confidence" that North Korea had mastered nuclear warhead technology.
North Korea's statement was released just hours after Trump warned the Kim Jong-un regime that it "will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen" if it does not stop threatening the US, Efe news reported. That ultimatum is likely to resonate in Asia, where memories of destructive U.S. aerial bombing raids, including those on Japan's Hiroshima and Nagasaki, continue to loom large. After one successful long-range missile test in July, state media declared North Korea as a "proud nuclear state" with an ICBM rocket "that can now target anywhere in the world".
The sanctions were adopted over the weekend; on Monday, North Korea accused the USA of a "felonious crime" and threatened "to take ultimate measures".
"I'm a little anxious, a little panicked". Others shared similar sentiments about the seriousness of the situation.
North Korea's threat came after Trump's extraordinary remarks at his New Jersey resort of Bedminster Tuesday.
US Andersen Air Force Base on Guam hosts the nuclear-capable B-1B strategic bombers, which were sent back by the US to the Korean peninsula on Tuesday, according to Yonhap news agency, citing South Korean military sources. It should be an intensive one. "We are not just a military installation", he added.
A Korean People's Army spokesman said in a statement carried by state-run KCNA news agency the plan would be put into practice at any moment once leader Kim Jong Un makes a decision.
- They also followed threats by Pyongyang to "make the USA pay dearly" for helping spearhead the passage of new United Nations sanctions against the country in response to two recent missile tests. "The US has said all options are on the table and Japan welcomes this".
Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, told CNN's Erin Burnett that a preemptive strike against the North Korean regime would require Congress' approval.
North Korea, which is pursuing missile and nuclear weapons programs in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions, also accused the United States of devising a "preventive war" and said in another statement that any plans to execute this would be met with an "all-out war, wiping out all the strongholds of enemies, including the US mainland". "They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen", he said.
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Mourinho added: "We were playing a team full of fantastic players but we discussed (contested) the result until nearly the end". The two have clashed at times ever since they parted ways when Mourinho left Madrid, but this was a public show of friendship.
"This is precisely what the North Koreans want".
"I think a number of observers' fear on this issue, and on a number of issues in this administration, is that perhaps there wasn't a careful consideration of the words of our commander in chief in this instance", said David Pressman, a former deputy US ambassador to the United Nations.
In the spring of 2013, state media cited leader Kim Jong Un as having ordered his military to prepare plans on launching strikes on US military bases in Guam, Hawaii and South Korea as well as the American mainland.
The resolution, which targets the country's worldwide revenue streams, was passed unanimously after strong lobbying from the United States.
Guam, popular with Japanese and South Korean tourists, is protected by the advanced U.S. Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) anti-missile system, deployed in South Korea. However, what the public sees from North Korea is uninterrupted progress on nukes (with no assurance that sanctions will influence its behavior), and from the administration, not deft global diplomacy, but over-the-top and potentially risky rhetoric.
"It strikes me as an amateurish reflection of a belief that we should give as we get rhetorically".
The North Korean Strategic Force said its new plan aims to "contain" the US military bases on Guam including the Anderson Air Force Base in which USA strategic bombers are stationed.
President Donald Trump is retweeting news coverage about his heated rhetoric against North Korea, even as his secretary of state is downplaying Trump's words.
Martin Schaefer told reporters in Berlin on Wednesday that Germany "calls on all parties to show restraint".
Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said a "conflict (with North Korea) would be shattering".
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