Trump national security aides complete North Korea policy review: official

Rooters ^ | 2 Apr 2017 | Matt Spetalnick

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump's top national security aides have completed a broad review of U.S. options aimed at countering North Korea's nuclear and missile programs, a senior U.S. official said on Sunday.

The review, which was accelerated to have it done before Trump's summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping this week, includes a range of economic and military measures but leans towards new sanctions and increased pressure on Beijing to rein in its neighbor, the official said.

The list of recommendations was put together by Trump's National Security Council on his orders and was ready for his consideration, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

It was not immediately clear if the review had reached the Republican president's desk or how quickly he would decide on a course of action, which could be delayed by the slow pace at which the administration is filling key national security jobs.

The White House declined comment...

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SNARK ALERT --

Now the White House is being blamed for the 'slow pace' of filling key national security jobs'.

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which could entail “secondary sanctions” against Chinese banks and firms that do the most business with Pyongyang.

This could be easily circumvented unfortunately. They only have to install a third entity, which serves as a conduit to N. Korea. They do business with such an entity which then deals directly with N. Korea. It is not even hard to create a series of small intermediaries, either. When those intermediaries are caught, Chines only need to shut them down while springing up a bunch of new ones.

The better course of action is to slap more tariff to products produced by Chinese firms who get heavy subsidy from Chinese government, which can be trimmed if Chinese show real commitment. Whatever sanction U.S. chooses, it should be something very difficult to circumvent and which could also incur serious damage.