President Trump Continues Aggressive Talk on North Korea
ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.</s>JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: Good afternoon, and welcome to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper. We are going to begin with breaking news in our world lead. Just minutes ago, President Trump not only did not back down from his threat that if North Korea keeps acting the way it is, it will face -- quote -- "fire and fury, the likes of which this world has never seen before." The president said it -- quote -- "maybe wasn't tough enough." And then he issued another stark warning.</s>DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: North Korea better get their act together, or they're going to be in trouble, like few nations ever have been in trouble in this world.</s>TAPPER: President Trump is currently meeting with members of his national security team. That's a meeting that was recently added to his schedule. Today, North Korea, that country's military announced that a plan to fire four missiles to the waters near the U.S. territory of Guam will be ready for Kim Jong-un's consideration within days. We have our team of CNN reporters spread out throughout the globe, from Guam to South Korea to China to the White House, covering all angles of this fast-developing story. CNN's Jeff Zeleny is at the White House. And, Jeff, just a short time ago, the president speaking with reporters, he would not rule out a preemptive strike on North Korea.</s>JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Jake, he did not rule out a preemptive strike on North Korea. He said he would not be like previous presidents, meaning President Obama, and not show his hand on foreign policy. But he said three times that his words earlier in the week, fire and fury, were not strong enough. This is what he had to say today.</s>TRUMP: If North Korea does anything in terms of even thinking about attack of anybody that we love or we represent or our allies or us, they can be very, very nervous, I will tell you what. And they should be very nervous, because things will happen to them like they never thought possible.</s>ZELENY: So, very strong words there, indeed. Now, he did leave open the door, though, to negotiations, Jake. He said, yes, there's always a path, room for negotiation. But it seemed to be a pretty narrow path as well. But he also held out hope that China could be helpful to the U.S. as it deals with North Korea.</s>TAPPER: And, Jeff, there have been a number of different kinds of messages we're hearing from the Trump administration, what the president said, what Secretary Mattis said, the more diplomatic statements from Secretary of State Tillerson. There's a White House aide, former Breitbart editor Sebastian Gorka, seeming to criticize Tillerson, saying don't look to him for comments about the military. It's nonsensical. Did the president say anything about the interpretation that there are lots of different kinds of messages coming from his administration?</s>ZELENY: He did, Jake. He was asked about this mixed messages. He was asked about if his administration is speaking with one voice. Not surprisingly, he said they were. Let's listen.</s>TRUMP: There are no mixed messages. There are no mixed messages. I heard -- to be honest, General Mattis may have taken it a step beyond what I said. There are no mixed messages.</s>ZELENY: But, again, there has been a sense, Jake, of the administration looking to find a policy after the president made those comments earlier this week that were simply improvised. Some of his aides were surprised by them. Others were not because he had said similar things in private. But, Jake, the president also mentioned the three predecessors in the office, President Clinton, President Bush and President Obama, by name, criticizing all three of them. He said his policy toward North Korea would be different -- Jake.</s>TAPPER: All right, Jeff Zeleny at the White House, thank you so much. Earlier, the rogue regime responded to President Trump's fire and fury threat by mocking him. Through a state media report, they called his remarks nonsense and accused the president of -- quote -- "failing to grasp the grave situation." Let's go now to CNN's Will Ripley in Beijing. And, Will, you have been to North Korea more than any other Western journalist, 13 times in all. What do you read from this latest threat from North Korea and how the North Korean government might react to another warning from President Trump?</s>WILL RIPLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're going to have to find out in the coming days, Jake, whether what they said in this statement, which essentially they laid out very technically their plan to launch simultaneously four intermediate-range missiles and put them down in the water less than 20 miles from Guam, do they actually have that technical capability? Is this something they could actually pull off. If North Korea believes that they can do that, then we could very likely see an attempt to do what they spelled out in this statement, because it's very unusual for North Korea to go into such great detail. But we just don't know if it was a bluff and if they're just going to come out with more rhetoric or if they're actually going to take action. Also noteworthy, China, there was definitely a strong message in President Trump's words for China, essentially threatening action on trade if China doesn't do more to rein in North Korea. Here in Beijing, Chinese officials have repeatedly warned the United States not to conflate those two issues. North Korea is a strategic issue for China, trade an economic issue -- Jake.</s>TAPPER: All right, Will Ripley, thank you so much. Now let's go to Guam. The Pacific island in U.S. territory is the focus of North Korea's latest threat, as you just heard from Will. It's also home to two U.S. military bases and thousands of American citizens. CNN's Ivan Watson is there. And, Ivan, President Trump just sought to reassure Americans, even as he issued another strong warning. But with this very specific threat from North Korea to strike the waters off the island, what is the response there in Guam?</s>IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You know, the local authorities here, the governor of Guam, who you interviewed yesterday, he hasn't issued a new response to this. He's standing by his position that the threat level has not increased to this island from when this kind of war of words between Washington and Pyongyang first began. I spoke at length with the governor, who said that he's confident in the U.S. military and its ability to protect this island from the ongoing kind of verbal and written threats now coming from North Korea. And he kind of stressed that there is a security umbrella here. There's an architecture of overlapping defensive measures that can protect this American island from the threats coming from North Korea. And he points out that any missiles that would be fired from North Korea would have to fly down through South Korea, over Japan, and then over hundreds of miles of open water and ocean to reach Guam, and that, in doing so, it would have to pass through areas where you have other U.S. military bases, where you have the militaries of South Korea and Japan, which could all provide a protective buffer. And then, at the end, there is the last line of defense here in Guam, which is a THAAD missile defense system, put in place after previous threats by North Korea against Guam in 2013. That confidence from the local authorities not reflected by all people on the ground here, some people quite worried that North Korea is threatening their home. It's a tough message to try to tell your children, for example, on this island that's home to more than 160,000 Americans.</s>TAPPER: All right, Ivan Watson in Guam, thank you so much. Before President Trump turned the heat up another notch today, South Korea warned its neighbor to the North to tone down the threats. CNN's Alexandra Field is live for us in Seoul, South Korea. And, Alexandra, how is the South Korean government reacting to all these provocations?</s>ALEXANDRA FIELD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jake, you just heard President Trump say that he is standing up for other countries, and other leaders around the world support him. The war of words has turned up the heat on South Korea perhaps more than anyone else, because we all know that if North Korea wanted to conduct an attack or if they felt that they were retaliating for some kind of attack, they could do catastrophic damage right here in South Korea using their conventional weapons before the U.S. military is believed to be able to overwhelm them. Defense officials here in South Korea have come out and said that Pyongyang's threats against Guam, threats against the U.S. are a challenge to the U.S.-South Korean alliance. They say that they're standing with their allies here. They say that further provocations would be met with military response, but they are also continuing to say that they want to see dialogue happen. No one has more interest in seeing a peaceful resolution than the people of South Korea. So, the part of the statement that they heard from President Trump just a few minutes ago that they will be perhaps most interested in hearing, most optimistic about is where he leaves the door open for the possibility of negotiation, slim as he paints that possibility to be -- Jake.</s>TAPPER: All right, Alexandra Field in Seoul, South Korea, thank you so much. We are expecting new comments on the North Korean threat from President Trump when he exits that national security meeting. We will bring that to you when we get it. So, is this verbal escalation the right move? A member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is here, and we will discuss that next. Stay with us.