Times versus Washington Post versus trump the last great newspaper war. I think its a classic on one level newspaper war but its also one in which both could win but also both could lose. So to that extent, its not like your traditional newspaper war. And the ultimate questions have to do with a combination of factors including the ongoing implosion of the traditional Business Model, the media, and then the coming of a president of the United States who so actively tries to devalue and delegitimize the press. Rose we con clues with eye vor prickett he documented the battle of mosul as a photographer for the New York Times. His photographs show both the humanitarian and destructive side of war. What im interested in as a photographer when im working in these kind of situations is the toll that war has on the people caught up in it, both the soldiers themselves and the civilians. But its really, you know, the human toll. Rose north korea, james warren and eye vor prickett when we continue. Funding for charlie rose is provided by the following. Bank of america, life better connected. And by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Tensions between the United States and north korea escalated dramically following President Trumps warning that the countrys Nuclear Threat would be met with fire and fury. North korea best not make any more threats to the United States. They will be met with fire and fury, like the world has never seen. He has been very threatening beyond a normal state, and as i said they will be met by fire, fury and frankly power the likes of which this world has never seen before. Rose the president remarks came after reports had emerged that in the korea developed a miniature warhead, Rex Tillerson attempted to calm fears of military confrontation with north korea following the president s comments. What the president is didding is sending Strong Language to north korea in language kim jungun would understand because he doesnt understand normal language. With the unquestionable ability to defend itself, will defend itself and its allies and i think it was porn that he deliver that message to avoid any miscalculation on their part. Rose north korea thaid korea said it is carefully exaping a plan to strike guam. Mattis said jim kungun kim jungun should cease any retaliations that would end the regime and drusks its people. Joining me is david ignatius, columnist for the Washington Post, in new york jamie metzl, senior fellow at the atlantic council. First to washington and david. So david, where are we and how close are we to some dramatic miscalculation . Whal, the chance of miscalculation is real and now a constant. I think were in the early stages of what i would have to call nuclear brinksmanship. The president is directly threatening military action, hr mcmaster as National Security advisor has said the president regards the north Korean Nuclear missile threat on the United States as intolerable. I take him at his word. That means that he and secretary mattis and others are preparing military options. At the same time, in this period of brinksmanship there is a very active diplomatic effort under way in which the United States is trying to convince china that the danger of American Action is so great that china should infect mediate negotiations, reconvening, if you will, of the Six Party Talks that took place a decade ago, to try to negotiate denubbing larrization of the Korean Peninsula. So it is a fin es game, to have the president use such red hot rhetoric in such a delicate moment, i think astonished many observers, certainly me, and drew today comments much more measured comments from secretary mattis and secretary tillerson trying to emotionally walk it back. I just dont think its possible. The president uses language like that, people remember it. Rose and you can in the walk it back. Are you saying t is out there and it matches the language of kim jungun. I mean he uses the same words, fire and walls and balls of fire, raining down on you. Theyre almost cartoon kowntd images. I think the President Trump must believe that this is his secret weapon, if you will, of being seen as a risktaker, willing to do anything, that that is going to convince china to get involved. I think he this is the greatest test of his career, his presidency i think may hinge on how he behaves. He seems to think he has it calibrated right and almost everybody else 150e78s to disagree. Rose he also miscalculated in terms of if he promised the chinese it would he would be less difficult on trade if they would do something on north cor yarks they didnt do it. Then he began to criticize them so the trade as part of the threat hes wielding the chinese, help us out or well have trecial consequences we might go to war with north korea, we might slap you with trade sanctions that would be devastating for your economy. I understand all the pressure points. To do this all in public the way the president does and sometimes in 140 character slices, thats the part thats hard to understand. These are the most delicate subtle messages and so much hinges on themment you just want to make sure that theyre better calibrated than they seem to be. How do you see it . I think this is really concerning. The world has already fact erred in that the Supreme Leader of north korea is hostile. He has verbal excesses, hes unpredictable. That is already fact erred in. The world has not fact erred in that the president of the United States will play that role. And so when President Trump says things like we are going to bring this fire and fury, greater than the world has ever seen, that means nuclear war. And so for the president of the United States to be threatening nuclear war in this kind of situation is extremely destabilizing. A lot of this is dram blanca at the end of the day, all the countries have their interest. China is not interested in the conflict, north korea, they would like to threaten but they know if they have an attack on the United States or any of our allies that could likely mean the end of their country and that is not what they want. The United States knows if we have some kind of military action, that particularly seoul will be severely damaged and tens or hundreds of thousands of people will be killed. So a lot of this is drama. But we have ownerred, injected into this very complex situation, the unpredict ability of the american president. And i think thats what is hanging this context. David, i talked to the former vice chairman joint chiefs of staff this morning on cbs this morning. He suggested that in the koreans do not want to attack the United States. What this really is is in their mind a kind of deterrent to being attackedment because they generally believe the United States would like to come in and overthrow the regime or damage it in some other way. Do you believe that and do most of the people in the National Security apparatus believe that . I, well, i think judgements differ. Whether the North Koreans are doing this for selfprotection because they fear that kim jungun doesnt want to end up like moammar qaddafi giving up his Nuclear Weapons then being deposed and killed soon after, or whether there is a more hostile intent is hard to know. There is a cult of militant selfreliance that is really the foundation of the modern north korea, that backs all this up. I just like jamie, i think the danger of miscalculation, misreading north korea is so large now, i spent a lot of today talking with people about what would be involved if, as our military commanders begin to think about military options. And it is an immensely complicated problem. Its not just the population of seoul would be in effect hostage to the north Korean Missile strikes, conventional missile strikes. There are perhaps a million, up to a million americans who are there. A million nonamerican foreigners there. You have a situation in which the troops would be rushing north, the civilians flee south. It just, it is the most complicated and potentially catastrophic battle space. Secretary mattis said this would be the worst kind of battle field situation weve seen in the world since world war ii. And i think when mattis says that, you better take it seriously. Let me understand this. I dont really understand this. Have the American People at the pentagon and at the white house, the leadership of the National Security community, have they ruled out the idea that they can live with north korea having Nuclear Weapons . That they can contain them . I think containment is not the order of the day. The president has essentially said the situation with north korea possesses these weapons is intolerable. Now you can argue that weve already passed that threshhold, that they have by the di estimates, the Washington Post cited yesterday, they have between 50 and 60 Nuclear Weapons already. And they mastered the technology for miniaturizing them and putting them on top of missile. So in truth, we may be locking the barn door far too late. But i think that this line is, i dont think its a bluff. The problem is when a president says and has his National Security advisors say this is not acceptable to the United States t is intolerable, then you almost are required to back it up. And i think thats again part of the problem is this is so public, were back in this red line territory that ended up being crippling for the obama presidency. But you remember that obama used to say the same thing about iraq. I mean iran having Nuclear Weapons. It was unacceptable. We would never stand for that. Again, there is a diplomatic track. If the United States can bring enough pressure to bear, can get enough support from china and others to open these talks, the idea that they begin next month when the General Assembly convenes, that is an extraordinarily positive development, the moment in which china steps up to its responsibilities and we have the denubbing larrization of the Korean Peninsula is a desirable goal for everybody. I dont want to rule out the idea that we can get there. Rhe. Rose you wrote a thing called 12 things for trump to know about north korea. What does he need to know about north korea, and the possibility of engaging china in the solution. There are a few really big things. The first is that north korea is developing Nuclear Weapons for very rational reasons, north korean lead ares wanted to get the level of security they get by having Nuclear Weapons, by they would spend hundreds of times more than their entire gdp. So its a very rational act by the North Koreans, because they are focused on regime survival. And so because of that, the only way the North Koreans are going to give up their Nuclear Weapons is if they come to believe that the cost of keeping Nuclear Weapons is greater than the cost of giving them up. And the only way thats going to happen is if there is so much pressure on them through the one country that they depend on for their existence, and thats china. China provides up to 90 of the total trade with north korea goes through china. It provides the food that goes to the north korean military, and the oil that keeps everything running, so without china north korea will collapse 6789 and china is in this very precarious situation. On one hand north korea exists because of chinas intervention in the korean war. Maos son died in that war. There is a very strong, historic connection to north koreament and the existence of north korea is a buffer against the reunification of korea, potentially allied with the United States which china would fear. On the other hand the cost to china are great and growing of north korea Nuclear Weapons because it strengthens americas presence in the western pacific, which china doesnt want it strengthens americas relations with japan and south korea, justifies National Missile defense, could lead to an arms race and a Nuclear Arms Race in the region. It justifies Japanese Military normalization, all of these things and the Missile Defense shields. And all of these things are not in chinas interests. And so if the United States wants to have an irrational policy, we should continue making these kinds of claims that we cant back up, declaring red lines that are pushed through in minutes. But if you want to have a real policy we have to think strategically about what are all the levers that we have to influence china to take a stronger line on north korea. Unfortunately the Trump Administration has weakened our alliances with japan and korea, undermined our pressure on china, particularly but not exclusively by withdrawing from the transpacific partnership, and is seen as an entirely unreliable partner by our adversaries and allies alike. So its a very complicated situation. But americas behavior is making it even worse. Whose argue of any divisions within the white house, in the National Security establishment, david . I think that there was some concern, con ster nation, even, after the president s statement yesterday fire and fury statement, this is something that has preoccupied senior officials for many weeks, really, since the beginning of the administration. Theyve been thinking about it and i think people werent ready for this the that particular verbal grenade to be thrown and theyve been trying to walk it back as we discussed earlier. The, i just what note, speaking in some ways to jamies good point about the larger context of the Korean Peninsula, north koreas paranoia, i think one good thing about the diplomatic effort that tillerson, secretary tillerson has lead is that it has tried to speak to chinese and north korean concerns about where this would end up, that the chinese are terming this statement that tillerson made last week in which he said the United States doesnt seek to overthrow the regime in north korea, doesnt seek to go north of the 38th parallel, doesnt seek this, doesnt seek that. China the four nos they regard that as quleunted states acceptance of the basic chinese requirements in terms of the future status of the peninsula. Its very interesting that tillerson was willing to say that so specifically and that the chinese welcomed it, celebrated it. They think that theyve gotten basically the key u. S. Statements about the issues jamie was talking about. Dip plom see 245 actually moves toward real reassurance, you know, the specifics of how this would look, what the future would be like, how you deal with the issue of union if i kaition, for example. I think if this got serious those would immediately become the key issues. And the first step is the chinese ability, chinese willingness and ability to convene a new set of talks soon because this crisis just cant bubble alongk i dont think, the way it is for, indefinitely. Rose david thank you so much for joining us this evening. Thank you, charlie. Rose jamie, good to have you. Well be right back. Stay with us. Readership of the Washington Post and New York Times has skyrocketed since the 2016 election and primary campaign. Their resurgence comes in spite of President Trumps criticism of the media giants. In february he called the news media in a tweet the enemy of the American People. But continuous leaks from the administration have offered a lifeline to newsrooms competing for inside knowledge about the goings on at the white house. Joining me from chicago is james warren, the chief media writer for poynter and writer for vanity fair magazine. His latest piece in vanity fairs September Issue asked is the New York Times versus the Washington Post versus trump the last great newspaper war. Im pleased to have him on this program. Welcome. Great to see you. My pleasure. Rose to have you on the show. And coming from a lifetime of tbreat reporting, i mean that. So let me talk abo