Hours after President Trump suggested on Twitter on Wednesday morning that he is uninterested in using diplomacy to ease tensions with North Korea, his own defense secretary rebuked him. “The U.S. has been talking to North Korea, and paying them extortion money, for 25 year,” the president tweeted. “Talking is not the answer!” In direct response to that tweet, Secretary James Mattis told pool reporter Tara Copp of Military Times: “We’re never out of diplomatic solutions.” On Tuesday, North Korea carried out a missile launch that its government claimed was a “prelude” to striking the U.S. territory of Guam.
