SEOUL, South Korea—US Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis on Saturday warned North Korea of a “massive military response” to any use of nuclear weapons as tensions remain sky-high ahead of Donald Trump’s visit to South Korea. Mattis did not specify the threshold of nuclear weapon activity that would trigger a military response. Trump is expected to deliver a speech at the South’s parliament and to visit an US military base during a Nov. 7-8 trip to Seoul. Since then he has overseen four of the country’s six nuclear tests and hailed its nuclear weapons as a “treasured sword” to protect itself from potential invasion by the “imperialist enemy” the US. Growing nuclear threats by the North prompted calls by some Seoul lawmakers to deploy tactical US nuclear weapons in the South, but Song dismissed such a possibility.

Source: The Standard October 28, 2017 16:41 UTC