kerry is on his way. he will this week go to beijing, tokyo and seoul and he ll be talking about what s going on. but particularly with the chinese, trying to see if they can narrow the gap and figure out, persuade the chinese that they have a mutual interest in stopping this behavior by kim jong-un. also, i m told, and it s probably publicly known, that the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff is heing over there in the next couple of weeks and so will the cia. the idea is to, quote, have a deep dive into beijing and have everyone try to convince the top leadership in beijing that they hold the key, and that it s in their interests as well as everybody else s interest to get this brought back from the brink. you know, again, while they know, and jay carney said just a couple of minutes ago, that this is the way for north korea to step back. the problem is, does kim jong-un really understand this off-ramp as admiral locklear pointed out.
so they are very concerned. i was fascinated by senator levin and indeed the admiral in charge of the pacific command, admiral locklear, who testified today, that they would not necessarily recommend shooting down a north korean missile unless it was aimed in anger and targeted either at the u.s. homeland or at allies like japan or south korea. that they wouldn t recommend shooting that down, because they are terribly afraid of miscalculation, and generating a wider conflict. they re worried also, because obviously the pressure is on south korea and the new president precisely because of what you were discussing, because they did not respond the last time their ship was destroyed, 46 sailors were killed. they didn t respond when the island was attacked. and so now they re concerned that the south koreans will have to respond if there is ap an attack that threatens them or their people. our producers in the region have been calling around and the latest information, you heard
be a response. now, he didn t lay out what the options are, nor should he in public. but he did say very precisely, that this time it would be likely and expected there would be a response. frankly, i think it s obvious that the north koreans would face some kind of a response in the words of admiral locklear, and this time would not get off without that kind of response. it would be presumably proportionate in some way to what the attack is. we re not going to up the ante and have events spiral out of control, if we can help it. but north korea s not going to get off scott-free if they attack an ally. 50,000 troops in japan, 6,000 on the island of guam. and it raises questions, have they gone into a heightened state of alert? well, we ve i assume they have.
know as much as soon. in this case, in the scenario we re in, we re possibly looking at being able to see it being in a general location and then to sense a launch. reporter: will north korea launch or stand down? locklear says it s hard to read kim jong-un. his father and grandfather always figured into their provocation cycle an off ramp of how to get out of it, and it s not clear to me that he has thought through how to get out of it. reporter: u.s. officials are working through the assumption that he will not issue a mariners warning. that s a warning don t be in this area at this specific time because that s where the missile could land. it s also a heads up that a missile launch is imminent. they re operating under the assumption that north korea may
a south korean island. so whether this is a test of a missile which is providing it s not targeted at south korea, the u.s., any of our allies, providing it is aimed at the water as a missile test, that s a very different deal than if it s targeted at us or our allies? what if it is that worst case scenario? is the u.s. ready to take military action against north korea? we are. our pacific commander today said that we are ready with a variety of responses for the south koreans or us to choose should there be an attack on south korea or on us, but it s also clear, he said, that we can shoot down a missile that is aimed at us. those two points were made very clearly this morning by admiral locklear, both that we can shoot down a missile if it is targeted