"Save your energy Rex," Trump added, before slipping in another thinly veiled threat of a military strike: "we'll do what has to be done!"
However, despite Trump's truculence, the source said the behind-the-scenes contacts with North Korea have resumed although they remain fragile amid concerns that Trump may again take to Twitter with more threats and insults -- and again put the intermediaries in a no-man's-land facing angry North Koreans leaders doubting the honesty and integrity of individuals supposedly representing the U.S. government.
The source said Trump has been apprised of this danger and supposedly has agreed not to undercut these intermediaries again.
President Trump meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York on Sept. 18, 2017.
(Image by (Screenshot from Whitehouse.gov)) Details DMCA
But Trump lacks enough sophistication about international relations to understand the complexities of the global chessboard and the risks involved in his erratic behavior. He is also susceptible to having his head turned by the last person who speaks with him, particularly if that person is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Some people around Trump traced the President's destructive U.N. speech, in part, to Netanyahu's insistence that Trump get in line behind the Israeli policy of continued hostility toward Iran and Syria.
When Trump was delivering the address to a mostly stone-faced General Assembly -- with many delegates clearly distressed listening to crude threats of war at the podium of an institution created to achieve peace -- one of the few visibly happy people in the building was Netanyahu as Trump embraced neoconservative war policies, albeit behind "America First" rhetoric.
Trump has continued to toe Netanyahu's line in the President's current threats to refuse certification that Iran is abiding by the 2015 nuclear-weapons accord even though senior administration officials and international inspectors have confirmed that Iran is in compliance.
So, the fate of Tillerson's backchannel diplomacy may ultimately rest on whether the troublemaking Netanyahu pulls Trump's chain again or whether President Zigzag wakes up at 3 a.m. with an itchy Twitter finger and a desire to look tough.
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