president pence with a visit to the cemetery, the national cemetery here to honor those who fought. he then came here to meet with troops, but it gets serious after this point. he goes on to meet with the acting president of the south korea. from here, he ll go on to tokyo, where he ll meet with the prime minister. they ll be tackling head on the question about what to do to counter the growing north korean nuclear threat. you have another provocation again from north korea this morning, that failed missile launch. what they re really talking about now is a wider view, the long-term strategy, the secretary of state from the u.s. had been out here last month announce that the era of strategic patience was over. so what s the response now? what role will the u.s. take? those are all questions the vice president will talking about as he continues his tour through asia, ivan. and alex, this isn t just a time of regional tension. it s also a time of deep uncertainty in south korea, this c
valor. this, of course, an incredible time that the vice president lands, just after north korea tested another missile. for more about that and this trip, let s go to ivan watson now in the region. thank you, natalie. north korean state media so far have not reported on pyongyang s failed missile test early sunday. south korea says the rocket was launched from the north korean port of sinpo on the east coast. the u.s. military says it blew up immediately so there wasn t much time to gather data. this latest provocation came just hours before u.s. vice president mike pence arrived in seoul for the first leg of a trip to asia and australia. now, alexandra field is in seoul, and cnn s will ripley is reporting from pyongyang at this time. i m going to go to alex field first. you re at the headquarters of the u.s. military, which has nearly 30,000 troops deployed in south korea. and of course, this is a
as a deterrent against provocation from pyongyang. all indications we re getting from washington right now are that there really won t be a reaction. they have acknowledged that a failed test happened. really, there will be no response beyond that. the thinking there is that there s no need to give any more attention to kim jong-un, no more focus to pyongyang at this moment because of this failed attempt, which again flouts so many sanctions that have been handed down. this is the fifth attempt at a ballistic missile launch just since the start of the year, as well as last year s unprecedented number of missile launch, ivan. all right. thanks, alex. we re going to go now to the north of the demilitarized zone to will ripley standing by in pyongyang. will, do you have the opportunity to ask north korean officials about this reported missile launch and apparent failure? reporter: yeah, we had a meeting with north korean officials today, ivan. certainly there are members of the north
arrived in south korea a short time ago. his plane landed in seoul just hours after the latest provocation from pyongyang, north korea. early sunday, the regime of kim jong-un tried but failed to test another missile. south korean officials say the launch attempt was made from the port city of sinpo on the east coast. a u.s. official says the land-based rocket malfunctioned almost immediately and exploded. cnn correspondents are covering these developments all across asia. alexandra field is live in seoul. matt rivers is in beijing. and will ripley is one of the few western journalists in north korea right now. we re going to start with alex. what more can you tell us about apparently this failed missile launch from north korea? reporter: well, we re learning what u.s. officials know. they believe this was a failed attempt, that this launch failed wng four to five seconds of the