All Options Are on the Table with North Korea. But for China and the US, All the Options Are Bad

Xi heard U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’s assessment last week that the U.S. considers North Korea more of a threat than Iran, and he believes U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s declaration that the Obama era of “strategic patience” is over. Xi also realizes that Trump — whom many Chinese consider no less a loose cannon than North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un — has a cabinet full of hawks and a free hand to act unilaterally and without warning whenever he believes it’s time to strike.