Sam Nunn Talks North Korea and Russia

Posted August 14, 2017

External Article: Georgia Public Broadcasting

Sam Nunn, distinguished professor in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at Georgia Tech, was interviewed in “Sam Nunn Talks North Korea and Russia” by Georgia Public Broadcasting.

Excerpt:

Well I think, first of all, when you're dealing with North Korea, I think statements we make ought to be very carefully framed.  I prefer the approach that Mattis, Secretary of Defense, took this morning with a very carefully worded statement that was very appropriate and gave the kind of warning without causing great alarm around the world and possible reactions that we don't want in North Korea and other places.  In fairness to President Trump, he is trying to deter conflict by North Korea and this behavior by conflict.  But saying that we were going to respond to North Korean threats, which basically occur probably every month, North Korea, always wants to get attention.  And they always have extreme rhetoric and they're always making threats.  Mattis basically framed his statement to talk about North Korean actions and that is the way it ought to be framed.

But one of the things that I would add is that we’ve got to be careful about South Korea.  We can't give the impression to South Korea, our ally, and also this applies to Japan -- that we care only about threats against America.  We are sworn to help protect the South Koreans.  And we need to keep that in mind because we do not want to see a split between the United States and the South Koreans based on their fear of some of our own language.

Listen to full interview here