At the moment, North Korea poses an existential threat to every U.S. citizen with an Iranian backed nuclear ICBM program and this needs to be clearly emphasized when addressing the public. Violence and the use of nuclear weapons however is not the answer. There are a plethora of more sanctions the U.S. can impose on not only China but anybody doing business with the North Korean regime. In Sean Hannity's podcast he states that "we have the means to decapitate the regime without using a singular nuclear weapon" and this is very true. U.S. satellite images have been able to spot ships transporting oil and other essential things for the regime to function. The U.S. should clearly express that anybody that does business with North Korea cannot do business with the United States. This would be exceedingly effective as many corporations, businesses, and people rely on business with the United States to see continued sucess. More specifically, the banking system among many other sectors can simply not afford to lose American business and will therefore cease all activity with North Korea. The U.S. is not powerless in regards to this issue. The U.S. has yet to even scratch the surface with regards to sanctions and other resources exerted to prevent the North Korean's from continuing their Nuclear program. The U.S. can stop being a paper lion without resorting to nuclear weapons or any other sort of violence.
This is very interesting Mr. Brown. However, much of the businesses North Korea does with, say, China is often fraudulently branded as "made in China." How would we be able to accurately discern who is trading with whom without being too invasive?
You bring up a very good point. This is most definitley a very tricky issue to navigate but perhaps more invasive issues may need to be taken to find out more, anything to avoid violence.