terms. kim jung unhad his brother killed. there is no point in negotiating with the north koreans. four occasions in the 25 years they have committed publicly to give up their nuclear weapons program in exchange for benefits that were promised to them. in every case they have violated their commitment typically before the ink was dry on it. they aren t going to voluntarily give up the nuclear weapons program or ballistic missile program. i think there is only one alternative here and that s to put enough pressure on them to have the regime collapse. the way to end the north korean nuclear weapons program is to end north korea through reunification of the peninsula. that s something we should be talking to the chinese about. it will be hard for the chinese to accept but they re the ones who said for many years they don t want a nuclear north korea. here is the way to achieve it. shannon: a couple of days
north korea could result in those weapons being transferred on to somebody else in the elites and we don t know what the consequences would be. kelsey, after this week s summit in florida, look at this, a report in the stars and stripes makes this point. china is reluctant to go too far due to fears that a north korean regime collapse could lead to a refugee crisis and possibly bring u.s. forces closer to its borders. what change would you expect china to make moving forward? i think the united states expects too much of china when it comes to north korea. because china is north korea s largest trading partner and because it shielded north korea from harsher sanctions in the past, washington tends to think that china can deliver a deal on north korea. what i think the new administration really needs to focus on is working with china to enforce the sanctions on the books and coming up with a joint strategy for talks. that should include an effort to try and freeze north korea s nucl
to protect that. that would really put you at odds with russia. they have no love of asad but they don t want to see that regime collapse in an unstructured way. russia has a long defense relationship with syria. they don t want to give up their foot hold in the middle east. secretary cohen, a quick question. should the trump administration now wait for congressional action passing of legislation authorizing the use of military force before taking additional direct military action against various syrian military targets? i think the president always has the power to act unilaterally when time does not allow for a full discussion. i think this action was authorized. i don t think he had to go to congress for this power. but to the extent this is the beginning of something much larger and it s going to affect multiple parties, multiple countries, then i think it s time for congress at least to vt opportunity to be heard. i don t expect them to be in
xi jinping is no fan of kim jong-un. the two have never met. at times the regime has frustrated china, even embarrassed china. but china does not want regime collapse in north korea. they see that as devastating. they would have refugees coming across the border, and taking a longer look at it, they re looking at the long game and thinking if there is regime change in pyongyang, that could lead to the reunification of north and south korea behind south korea as the leader, which is aligned with the united states. so strategically, this is not what china wants to see in the end. it was very telling that xi jinping did not make any sort of statement or comment at the state den, unlike shinzo abe when he was meeting with president trump and north korea had fired those missiles. the two men made a joint statement together. there was also no comment from any of chinese official orz any of xi s trusted advisers. so the question is what then happens next? what is also important is to see
is there any way to move that forward on a trip like this? no, i don t think so. all the serious north korea watchers do agree on one thing only beijing and china has any serious leverage over north korea and you ll hear a rationalization and they re accurate that china fears a collapsed korea. they fear a wave of refugees after a regime collapse. all true. bill, the crucial point everyone is missing is that china still sees north korea as an extremely useful military ally. in a war north korea would tie down an enormous proportion of u.s. assets. china is not ready to give up