NATIONAL SECURITY/NORTH KOREA/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “North Korea’s foreign minister warned his country would shoot down American warplanes even if they are outside of the country’s airspace, in an escalation Monday of the threat of a military confrontation.
Ri Yong Ho, speaking to reporters in New York, said the U.S. had declared war on North Korea and his country considered all possible responses to be on the table. He cited a Twitter post by President Donald Trump as the basis for saying the U.S. had declared war…
U.S. warplanes on Saturday [9-23-17] flew near the North Korean coastline north of the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea in a show of force.
The White House dismissed Mr. Ri’s assertion and the Pentagon brushed off the military threat…
A Pentagon spokesman said the U.S. maintains the right to ‘fly, sail and operate’ in international waters and airspace…
The comments by Mr. Ri came after days of rising rhetoric and tension between Washington and Pyongyang, including during last week’s gathering of world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly, where the crisis of North Korea’s drive for nuclear weapons topped the agenda.
Mr. Trump and North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un traded a series of personal attacks and each threatened use of military force.
Mr. Trump told the assembly the U.S. would ‘totally destroy” North Korea if it had to defend itself or its allies, calling its leader ‘Rocket Man.’ Mr. Ri called Mr. Trump ‘mentally deranged’ and said Pyongyang was prepared to test a hydrogen bomb over the Pacific Ocean. He said a North Korean missile attack on the U.S. mainland had grown inevitable because of Mr. Trump’s words.”
-Farnaz Fassihi, “U.S. Dismisses North Korea’s Talk of War,” The Wall Street Journal online, Sept. 26, 2017 06:26am