Senator Lindsey Graham says he advised Donald Trump tell China that the US would act to prevent North Korea from developing an intercontinental ballistic missile if Beijing doesn't.
One of Trump's fiercest critics within the Republican Party until this month, Graham said Wednesday that the sitting president has put the U.S. on a corrective course internationally. China and North Korea ought to take note, he said.
'Donald Trump is not going to let this nutjob in North Korea get a missile to hit America,' he told the hosts of Fox & Friends.
If Trump thinks a preemptive strike on Kim Jong-un is necessary to protect the West Coast, Graham told NBC he would support it. 'If that's what it would take,' he told Today.
The Armed Services Committee senator with hawkish views was so deeply at odds with Trump prior to presidency that he voted third-party in the general election.
A long-serving Republican lawmaker, Graham said he 'couldn’t go where' the Trump wanted to take the party or the country.
Graham boarded the Trump train in early April once the commander-in-chief authorized air strikes on Syria. As he changed his mind, Graham declared the Republican leader has in the instincts of the late Ronald Reagan.
He said today that he and Trump talk regularly. When they had lunch together, Graham says he advised Trump to threaten the Chinese with military action in North Korea if Beijing can't or won't use its economic influence to halt Kim's nuclear program.
'I said, "Do you want on your resume that during your presidency the North Koreans developed a missile that could hit the American homeland with a nuclear weapon on top of it?" And he said, "Absolutely not," ' the senator said.
Graham said he told Trump to tell China's Xi Jinping, if you don't take care of North Korea, we will.
'If China can't stop the regime from building a missile that could one day hit the American homeland, we would do everything, including diplomatic sanctions and military strike to stop their missile program,' he said of the message.
...
Originally Posted by Zippyjuan
Reply With Quote
Connect With Us