koreans for a long time now, especially in january of this year, is they were in the final stages of developing an intercontinental ballistic missile, a long range missile that could potentially hit the united states at some point. and this missile test does not appear to be, according to sources, that kind of a missile test. this missile we know only traveled about 500 kilometers or so before crashing into the sea. we still don't know yet whether it was a successful test or not. we're still talking to or sources here in south korea and in the united states. but officials from both sides confirm that this test happened around 7:55 a.m. local time. and it is in line with other tests that we have seen from the north koreans. it was in 2016 that we saw the north koreans fire off a record rate of these ballistic missile tests. we saw lots of tests throughout 2016 in addition to two nuclear tests. so what we're seeing this morning here on the korean peninsula is what's shaping up to be the first test for north

korea during the administration of donald trump. >> and athena jones is in florida with the administration as the president meets with the japanese prime minister and his wife. any word from president trump or his diplomatic team on this launch? >> reporter: ana, no word yet from sources i reached out to, not with the japanese staff traveling with prime minister abe. the press pool that travels with the president could at least ask him an opportunity, have an opportunity to ask him a question in the next few minutes or so. we don't know for sure they'll have that opportunity, but we'll certainly report back if the president does respond. as we've been saying, this is something there were signals about some time ago. u.s. intelligence satellites picking up signs of activity last month in north korea that signaled that this kind of test firing could be coming.

so it doesn't seem as though the white house or nsc should have been caught flat-footed. even though we're now hearing this maybe wasn't a successful test or didn't have much of a range, more smoke than fire, it's still an important first test, as we've been saying, for the trump administration. you'll remember that tweet in early january that we've been talking about where trump, then president-elect trump basically said something of a "make my day" tweet to north korea, saying north korea just stated that it is in the final stages of developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching parts of the u.s., it won't happen. clearly this is not a missile that could reach the u.s., it doesn't appear to be a nuclear missile, but it's clear north korea wanted to send a signal to president trump and wanted to do so exactly now, when he and the japanese prime minister are meeting for this weekend of diplomacy here at mar-a-lago, knowing how important the u.s.,

japan, and south korean trilateral alliance is for the pacific. it will be interesting to see how and when the national security council responds. >> we're monitoring president trump's twitter feed because we often know he likes to respond there first, we haven't seen anything yet. elise, this launch we do know was anticipated for some weeks. the warning by north korea back on january 1st that it is soon to having an intercontinental ballistic missile ready to go. and again, we can confirm that this was not an intercontinental ballistic missile, but it is the first launch of a north korean missile since the election of president trump. >> reporter: that's right. everybody thought this might happen during the inauguration. there seemed to be some activity around the missile site at that time. there were even some reports that there were missiles on the launchers ready to go.

that never took place, but there's always the expectation that north korea is going to try to get some attention with a test like that and also is going to continue these missile launches, continue to develop to get that icbm, that intercontinental ballistic missile. they don't seem to have that capability yet. but, you know, u.s. commanders in the pacific have said that they're on their way. and so this is one of the big issues that this trump administration, i understand, when president trump was meeting with president obama, this was one of the things that came up from president obama, something that president trump when he came into office needed to look at very closely. and u.s. officials now in the government tell me that this is something that they've been really worried about. and when north korea says they're going to do something, generally they do it. so i know that president trump was tweeting that north korea was trying to develop a missile, "it isn't going to happen," it

probably is going to happen, unless the u.s. is willing to take some type of military action or is willing to strike some kind of a deal with north korea. those are the kind of things that they're discussing. should the u.s. increase their defense posture in the region? should there be some type of preemptive action to stop north korea's missile and nuclear development? or should there be some type of way to reach out to the north koreans, working with the chinese? you remember during the campaign, everybody laughed it off a little bit, but president trump said i would be willing to talk to kim jong un. then there was some flurry of messages back and forth that the north korean leader didn't really take it seriously but would be willing to talk to any u.s. leader that would give north korea its due respect. no one took that very seriously at the time, but as we've been talking, what north korea really

wants, yes, they want acceptance, yes, they want food aid, but what they really want is not only a deal with the region but a deal with the united states. and president trump being a deal maker, this might be something that he thinks he wants to do. so we'll just have to see whether the u.s. starts with a much more aggressive posture. i would expect that's what they're going to do. i think we can expect some strong action at the u.s. security council. i also understand that the u.s. has been working just like it did with iran, you saw right after iran launched that intercontinental ballistic missile, right after that, the u.s. imposed some sanctions on north korea. i understand the u.s. is also working on sanctions for north korea to be at the ready. i don't think it's going to be a long period of time before you see some action on north korea by the u.s. administration, ana. >> let's go back to athena, i understand there's word from the white house. >> reporter: that's right, ana. it isn't much. it's clear the white house is being very careful about this. here is the word from a white

house spokesperson. "we are aware of the reports and are closely monitoring the situation." that is the extent of it, very similar to what we heard from other departments. we'll still await more possible word from the president if the press pool gets an opportunity to ask him a question. but as of right now, all the white house is saying is "we are aware of the reports and are closely monitoring the situation," ana. >> matt, since you're there in the region where so much of this really matters to the people who live there, what is the reaction on the ground there from the leader of south korea, for example? >> reporter: we know that the security council, the national security council here in south korea will be holding an emergency meeting at 9:30 a.m. this morning local time to discuss this situation. but you know, when it comes to missile tests like this, this is something south koreans are extremely used to, in fact this

entire region is used to this. what would have been brand-new is if this missile test would have been an intercontinental missile, a long range missile. but this kind of missile test is something the south koreans have been dealing with for a long time. this is a topsy-turvy time, given what we heard from president trump about perhaps pulling back commitment to south korean defense here. there are tens of thousands of u.s. troops stationed here in south korea. it was just last week or two weeks ago that secretary of defense james mattis chose to come to south korea on his first overseas trip as the secretary of defense. and i think what you saw here in south korea is a collective sigh of relief, because what secretary mattis said when he came here was an unequivocal statement that the united states is here to support the south koreans. they're going to do what it takes to stand up to the north korean nuclear threat. when it comes to this particular test, it's something south koreans have done before, but they were certainly reassured by the presence of secretary mattis

on his first overseas trip, ana. >> our thanks to all of you. we'll take a quick break. knowing where you stand. it's never been easier. except when it comes to your retirement plan. but at fidelity, we're making retirement planning clearer. and it all starts with getting your fidelity retirement score. in 60 seconds, you'll know where you stand. and together, we'll help you make decisions for your plan... to keep you on track. ♪ time to think of your future it's your retirement. know where you stand. ♪ timit has long been calledre storm of tiny bubbles, the champagne of beers.

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talk to your doctor about managing your symptoms proactively with linzess. >> announcer: this is cnn breaking news. >> we are continuing to follow breaking news. if you are just joining us, cnn has confirmed that north korea has launched some type of ballistic missile, this information coming from south korean and american officials. gordon chang is an author and columnist with the daily beast. lieutenant general mark hurtling is also with us. we heard matt rivers say the u.s. is still trying to determine if this was a successful test. what would make it successful? >> if it stayed together, first of all, ana. if it broke apart, that would

give an indication. the north koreans have often filed these launches toward the sea of japan. the accuracy of their weapons just are not very good. they aim and shoot and don't care where they land. they're trying to get distance. they're trying to read things like does the missile fall apart. they may have been testing some type of heat shield on the reentry vehicle. they may have been testing whether or not the missile could withstand g's. it could have been a weighted payload, not a nuclear payload, just to see how the missile reacted when something was placed on the top of it. i'm not a missileer, but there are a lot of things those who fire missiles are testing when they do these kinds of things. the interest pieing piece is, n korea has filed multiple missiles during 2016. and they said they would continue to work toward an intercontinental ballistic

missile. they're still doing that. they still have a lot of problems in their missile program. this is another launch where they're tweaking japan, the united states, china, and others, saying we still have the capability and we will continue to do this. >> gordon, i know you spoke earlier that the chinese could have an important role here. what could the u.s. do in collaboration with the chinese that could effectively count counter north korea's development of nuclear missiles? >> it could cut off delivery of coal and all sorts of things to undermine the north korean economy. but it hasn't done that. we've had a policy to work with beijing, that's been in effect since 2003. but nothing has seemed to push china in the right direction. the one thing we could do which we haven't tried, because we've

tried virtually every policy, is to impose sanctions on chinese banks and other entities that are quite coercive. if we did that, that would have all sorts of implications. nonetheless, what we've been trying to do with china hasn't been effective. we need to try something different, because beijing has basically said it's going to support the north korean regime and has been consistent with that over the course of decades. >> ana? >> go ahead. >> i'm sorry. one of the things that you have to walk a very fine line, having been assigned with forces in south korea, the policies that are involved between the united states, china, and japan, and south korea, all have to deal with not only attempting to get north korea to stop this kind of behavior, but you really run a very fine line between humanitarian disasters when you continue the kinds of sanctions that have been in place, you walk a fine line between how

many sanctions will affect the government versus how many sanctions will cause a humanitarian crisis and will affect the millions of people that live in north korea. one of the concerns of china, as i'm sure mr. chang will tell you, is the humanitarian crisis, it would cause an implosion in north korea, and a huge humanitarian crisis in north korea. it's what south korea has looked at, if the border opens up, if the dear leader is deposed and you have millions of north koreans who then need humanitarian assistance. that's troubling as well. >> nothing is ever simple when it comes to a solution, right? i do want to let you know, we're getting reaction now from south korea. according to the spokesperson for the acting president there, this is what they're saying. at 7:55 today, this is north korea time, on sunday, north korea fired what appeared to be a ballistic missile again.

the south korean government and the international community are working together to take punitive actions appropriate for this launch. gordon, what would be appropriate in terms of a reaction to this launch? it's obviously a fine line. and you have to kind of thread the needle, right, to show power but yet not provoke. >> well, we've always said that our sanctions are intended to bring north korea to its senses, not to its knees. and so there's room for additional sanctions on the north korean regime itself. we could add north korea to the state department's list of state sponsors of terrorism. we could go more effectively after their sources of money. but the real coercive penalties that we could impose are sanctions on chinese banks that have been involved in north korea's commerce. we have not done that. of course that would shock the global financial system. but it would tell beijing that we are serious about protecting

the american homeland. and we haven't done that, because we've tried to work the problem around the edges. there is a difference of approach we could take that we've never taken before. of course it would have adverse consequences. but we won't be know that the policies we have now just haven't worked over the course of decades. we've got to change. >> why do you think the u.s. and international counterparts haven't done what you're suggesting? >> well, because any time you impose real costs on a country, you could have north korea lash out. and north korea lashing out could be an invitation of south korea, which would be millions dead. there are all sorts of things north korea could do. it already has ballistic missiles that could reach the lower 48 states. they can't put an inco nuclear d to them, we think, that's several years down the road. we don't want that to happen. that's why we approach this in a

very gingerly manner of not imposing the highest sanctions. >> let's bring back elise labott, i know you've been listening in to this discussion, elise. your thoughts. >> reporter: i think gordon is right, there's a lot of things the u.s. hasn't done, particularly on the financial area. like, you remember what the u.s. did with iran. that was a very carefully-put-together strategy, what they call a sanction regime on iran which virtually cut iran off from the international financial system. now, north korea is a little bit different, because iran wanted to be part of that international system. the main lever that the u.s. has right now is china. and china has not been wanting to pull its influence on north korea to the extent that the u.s. would like. china has come a long way in recent years. some of the recent sanctions that have been put on north korea by the u.n. security

council, particularly blocking the export of north korean coal, that's a very big thing that china did. obviously it's not enough. the u.s. would like china to do even more. there are a lot of holes in those sanctions. but china over the years has grown increasingly frustrated with this young kim jong un, his young leader. his father, kim jong il, was a little bit more pragmatic. and you heard president trump, one of the things that he's saying in terms of a, quote unquote, deal with china, is that he wants china to take more action against north korea. and certainly they could. i think it's going to be very interesting to hear president trump at his next press availability, when he's asked about north korea and this latest test, and what he wants to do. i think one of the dangers is that previous administrations have avoided overreacting on these type of missile tests.

this is not a very long range missile. officials say it's bad, it's not earth-shattering. particularly in the obama administration, they were really careful to calibrate their response. this president is not someone who calibrates a response. you know, he's very fiery with his rhetoric, fiery with his tweets. and that goads north korea. i mean, they're playing a game a little bit with president trump. and i think the danger is, you get into this situation where the rhetoric escalates, and then -- north korea is very unpredictable, and you don't know what they would do. this is one 500-kilometer range missile. it's bad, but you don't want to see 12 of them in the next couple of days. it's not only a test to president trump. this is a missile testing program, a missile that north korea has not been able to successfully launch, so it's continuing to launch that and they'll continue to launch more. i've been speaking to experts

and they say this is just the beginning. this is just the beginning of the test to trump, just the beginning of launching these missiles in the trump administration. there's only been one a few weeks before the election. i think this is going to be a very precarious period right now. you know, i think that president trump's aides, particularly defense secretary mattis, secretary tillerson, his inner circle at the national security council, would be wise to get him to kind of take a breath and before he starts tweeting and before he starts with the rhetoric, to think about where this could go and where the u.s. wants it to go, and to enlist japan, south korea, and most importantly, china. >> general hertling? >> if i can, two things that i would like to point out. the united states military has been formulating a ballistic

missile defense program throughout east arab fsia for t last several years. it's more than sea-based systems. it's satellite systems that can determine where launches are going. when you have an errant launch into the sea of japan, no one's going to do anything about that. i'm sure we picked up that launch as soon as it left the launch pad in the facility in north korea. but there's another factor here too. i just remind everybody not to square the circle too much, because we've been talking primarily about china, south korea, japan, australia. there's another player in all of this, and that's russia. a lot of the equipment that these missiles are based from come from russia. there is an alliance between north korea and russia. and you remember, last year in the may day parade, the only foreign dignitary that traveled to moscow to sit near mr. putin during the may day was the president of north korea. >> all right. stay with me, all of you, i appreciate it. much more on our breaking news,

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>> announcer: this is cnn breaking news. breaking news here on cnn. the launch of some type of

ballistic missile from north korea. the exact type of missile we don't know yet, the exact flight path we also don't know. joining us know, ambassador hill who headed the u.s. delegation to six-party talks and who has negotiated with the north koreans numerous times in his career. also with us, athena jones. i want to start with you, athena, as i understand the president has recently come before cameras. did he say anything in reaction to what we've learned about north korea's missile launch? >> reporter: hi, ana. no, he didn't. but i want you to watch this tape and listen. you'll see exactly how it went down. then we can talk about it on the other side. go ahead and play that. >> reporter: north korea fired a projectile, do you know what happened, can you comment on that? >> reporter: so you can clearly hear that the president heard

that question and decided to ignore it. we saw a statement earlier from the white house spokesperson saying "we are aware of the report and are closely monitoring the situation." it's clear they're taking a cautious approach to responding to this. you guys have been talking about some maybe strategic reasons for not overreacting to what was in the end not a long range missile test, maybe more smoke than fire. a cautious approach, very different from what we might have expected from president trump if you look at that january 2nd tweet we were talking about where he had a sort of "go ahead, make my day" message. north korea stated it was in the final stages of developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching the u.s. "it won't happen." this is not as bellicose a response as we're getting from the white house or the president

himself, not answering a question he clearly heard, ana. >> let's bring in ambassador chris hill, again, significant because you, ambassador, headed the u.s. delegation to those six-party talks between 2005 and 2009, had numerous opportunities to try to negotiate with north korea. i wanted to get your reaction first to what we've learned of this missile launch. >> first of all, we don't know a lot about it. it might be a missile we've seen before. it might be something else. it might be a solid fuel missile, and that's something we're worried about because they could stand those up in a hurry before we could attack them. so there are a lot of questions about it. it does not appear to have been an intercontinental ballistic missile. so that's probably good news. but i think what we have to understand is north korea has an extremely robust missile testing program. they've continued it for some years now and i think they'll continue it for the future.

what's interesting is for the last month or so, they've been very careful not to do things that could be provocative in south korea. the south korean president has been impeached, she may well be convicted, they may be going to elections very soon in the next couple of months. the usual betting is, when north korea provokes in this way, the harder right of center benefits in south korea. many koreans feel there is a need to bring in the u.s. missile defense system, t.h.a.a.d. when the north koreans provoke, more and more south koreans say, we need that system. so we have to see. and of course i think we're all a little bit surprised that president trump chose to pass on it. maybe that's a good sign, because i think elise labott had it right, that he needs to kind

of talk to some people, think about these things before going public. >> as you mentioned, this was not an intercontinental ballistic missile. the range of that is typically somewhere near 5500 kilometers. this particular missile traveled about 500 kilometers. just to give that perspective to our viewers. again, officials still assessing whether this could be considered a successful launch, what kind of test exactly this was, what kind of missile this was. it's believed to be in the intermediate range when it comes to the missiles north korea has been testing in recent weeks, months, and years, obviously. ambassador hill, i'm wondering, given your experience with north korea in terms of negotiations, but not necessarily with their current leader, kim jong un, does it make a difference that he's the one who's at the helm right now in terms of how the u.s. and other international community leaders respond?

>> i think it does, because his father, kim jong il, appeared to care what the chinese thought. he would hold back on these kinds of things. frankly he had some interest in the negotiating process. there's no sign whatsoever that his son, kim jong un, first of all cares what the chinese think, let alone what we think, for has he expressed any interest taat all in negotiatio. there's been a lot of discussion, can the u.s. count on china. i understand the frustration, believe me. a lot of those negotiations we have with north korea, they are there kind of show the chinese that we're serious about trying to pursue this, and we try to work very closely with the chinese to come to a solution. the chinese have been very worried that to put additional pressure on north korea, for example to cut off fuel supplies, things like that, could result in some sort of chaos or implosion in north

korea. many people pointed out they're worried about refugees. perhaps, but i think they're worried about a much more strategic issue, which is, if south korea -- a lot of people in china think that way. it speaks to the need for the trump administration to kind of work closely with china. and i think it was a very positive sign a couple of days ago when president trump had that very good discussion with president xi jinping. obviously a lot to be done. we won't solve this alone. we need china to be along with us. >> meantime, prime minister shinzo abe is here in the u.s. meeting with president trump as we speak, presumably having dinner. we saw the photo opportunity there with both of the wives joining their husbands. what is the narrative that may

be playing out between those two individuals right now? >> i'm sure they're talking about north korea, i would like to think that would be the number one issue, although obviously the japanese prime minister is invested heavily in this multilateral trade agreement with east asia. obviously he and many other japanese are disappointed the u.s. has no interest. that would be a big issue, obviously. the north korean problem i think would probably be number one. i suspect there will be some discussion of whether or how to -- how we can better engage china in this. japan obviously has its tremendous frustrations and tensions with china. but japan has will had -- they've tried to improve things with south korea. that's a work in progress, especially as the south korean president over this lengthy corruption scandal looks like she may well be finally convicted of her impeachment, and they'll have a new government very soon. so they have a lot to talk

about. >> when you said that nothing seems to have broken through with this new young leader, kim jong un, what would you do? >> well, i think the key, frankly, you know, we need to get those antiballistic missile systems we're talking about, we need to get those fielded. they're expected to be so during this year. we need to do whatever we can to support our allies, south korea and japan. so we need to really step up that kind of cooperation. that's one. two, we really need to kind of sit down with the chinese and have a no-kidding discussion on where this could lead. the chinese worry that somehow the u.s. will take strategic advantage, that we'll have troops there, it will make china look back. we need to have a discussion with the chinese about our reaction, together with our allies and south korea, would be in the event of a north korean

implosion. china doesn't like to talk about those issues but it's very important that we be willing to do that and establish, dare i say it, some level of trust with the chinese. it's been a bit of a rocky start for the trump administration. but as i mentioned, i thought that conversation the other day in which president trump did accept the one-china policy is a good step. and i know there's a lot of talk about whether russia could be helpful. in my experience they've never been helpful on this. i'll leave it to president trump to decide what he can do with vladimir putin. >> ambassador chris hill, thank you so much for spending part of the your weekend with us, i appreciate it. much more on our breaking news, north korea's test of a ballistic missile and a development from mar-a-lago where president trump is having dinner right now with japan's prime minister. a live report from west palm beach, next. you're live in the "cnn newsroom." [burke] billy-goat ruffians. seen it. covered it. we know a thing or two because we've seen a thing or two.

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from overseas. now confirmed, a launch of a missile, some kind of ballistic missile from north korea. our white house correspondent athena jones is in south florida where president trump is playing host to the japanese prime minister this evening. with us, retired general hertling. athena, you're learning that the president has been briefed. >> reporter: that's right, ana, the president has been briefed about this north korea missile launch. and as you said, we saw video just a short while ago where you could clearly hear the press pool that closely follows the president's every move, as close as they can, asking him a question about north korea. the president clearly heard the question or appeared to hear it and chose to ignore it. we also heard from that same white house spokesperson earlier saying, "we are aware of the report and are closely monitoring the situation." this shows a white house that

wants to respond to this in a cautious way. it may be an indication of just how different campaign rhetoric is from governing. it might not be necessarily the kind of response one might expect from president trump, who has been rather aggressive in some ways towards allies like japan, south korea, saying during the campaign that maybe they should start developing their own nuclear weapons, pay more for u.s. protection. we didn't see that language in the joint communique that came out of the meeting yesterday, the first official meeting between the president and prime minister abe. we saw much more the usual diplomatic language coming from any administration, talking about the unshakeable alliance, the cornerstone of peace and stability in the asia pacific. it is important to note that north korea made this action, took this action the very day after, in that joint statement, japan and the u.s. strongly

urged north korea to abandon its nuclear and ballistic missile programs and not take any further provocative action. in that same statement talking about the importance of cooperation between the u.s., japan, and south korea, and their commitment to rigorous implementation of the u.n. security council resolution on north korea. this is north korea answering that statement and making this move while prime minister abe is here. >> general hertling, we're working to get more details about this launch. in terms of the briefing, what would have been discussed, how would that have gone down, do you think? >> i would think they would give him the details and pretty tss president for decisionmaking. everyone will focus on the military aspect of this, but

they will bring in all elements of national power. diplomacy, intelligence, information, economy, and the military in that principals meeting, which will likely meet in washington, dc. this is not necessarily something that the president has to get involved in immediately. but you can bet there's a bumping of folks pulling together, getting information to ambassador haley at the u.n., what she might be asked to do, pulling the chairman of the joint chiefs and the folks from the intelligence community together. mr. tillerson from the state department will come together. all of these individuals are new at their different departments, so they're going to be relying very much on the old hands who have the information. the south asia desk of the state department, the j5 in the pentagon, those in the cia who handle north korea. so they're going to get the information together and perhaps present some options in a dep y deputies committee and eventually a principals

committee. they probably wanted to get the president the most up to date information and say this is what's happening in the national security element of your government right now. >> these committee meetings that you speak of, how quickly does that happen? >> i would bet some of them are meeting right now. you know, with some of the underlings. they're pulling the facts together, the wires are hot between here and north korea and the japanese government, more than likely. i'm sure there's been some reach-out to, again, ambassador haley at the u.n., because she's going to have to pull some things together in that body. that probably won't happen tomorrow, but it certainly will happen on monday where north korea will be condemned. so as we're talking about this, the wheels of action are occurring within our government. but again, it is a new government, a new presidency, and a lot of the folks at the head of these organizations are new and still trying to find their way around their department. so a lot of the old hands will take over for the next day or a two. >> lieutenant general mark

hertling, athena jones, thanks to both of you. much more on our breaking news when we come back. (vo) maybe it was here, when you hit 300,000 miles. or here, when you walked away without a scratch. maybe it was all the times it got you safely out there. or all the times it got you out of there. maybe it was the day your baby came home. or maybe the day you realized your baby was not a baby anymore. every subaru is built to earn your trust. because we know what you're trusting us with. subaru. kelley blue book's most trusted brand. and best overall brand.

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before starting stelara® tell your doctor if you think you have an infection or have symptoms such as: fever, sweats, chills, muscle aches or cough. always tell your doctor if you have any signs of infection, have had cancer, if you develop any new skin growths or if anyone in your house needs or has recently received a vaccine. alert your doctor of new or worsening problems, including headaches, seizures, confusion and vision problems these may be signs of a rare, potentially fatal brain condition. some serious allergic reactions can occur. do not take stelara® if you are allergic to stelara® or any of its ingredients. most people using stelara® saw 75% clearer skin and the majority were rated as cleared or minimal at 12 weeks. be the you who talks to your dermatologist about stelara®. breaking international news right now. some details coming from the korean peninsula where it has been confirmed north korea did launch some sort of ballistic missile believed to be an

interest mediate range missile. let's bring our viewers up to speed. tell us what we know now about this launch and why it matters so much the type of missile the north koreans fired. >> our understanding and let's be clear, it's very early, the u.s. and its partners in japan and south korea are just looking now at this projectile it seems to be an inter mediate range missile and it seems to have gone for a range about 500 kilometers. now that's not very far. this is a missile that north korea has tested before and hasn't done so well. so it is continuing -- this is a missile testing program. it is continuing to try and develop that missile technology. its goal is that long range intercontinental ballistic missile which would be able to

hit the u.s. mainland. in addition to launching this missile, this is also a test for president trump who is meeting tonight with japanese prime minister shinzo abe at his retreat, his resort in mar-a-lago in florida. this is obviously a very important issue for the two leaders. which has been something that president trump has been very concerned about coming in and warned by president obama, this is going to be one of your number one national security threats. >> gordon, you'll recall during the campaign president trump then president-elect or candidate trump at the time was talking about perhaps scaling back support when it comes to military defense and support for countries like japan, like south korea, i would imagine a test like this changes things. >> well, it certainly does. last march when trump talked about withdrawing from the south

korean and japanese alliances he sent shockwaves through the region and as president he changed, he sent jamesmatt is to seoul and japan, that was to provide reassurance that united states would stand behind both alliances and you had trump yesterday standing behind the japan and u.s./japan defense treaty. i think we're going to see a very traditional american foreign policy in the trump administration, even though he threatened during the campaign to bring all of these norms that we were used to over the course of decades. >> we know james mattis met with folks in south korea last week and said any nuclear weapons used by north korea would be quote an effective and overwhelming response. it is just a ballistic missile test. whether it was successful or

not, still to be determined but elise, is there danger in overreacting? >> i think there is. we said any time north korea tests a missile of this range they are continuing too perfect the program. it's not like this is not important but it's not a development that the u.s. needs to kind of ramp up in a significant way its posture it's already doing it, u.s. south korea and japan have been looking at increasing deterrence and bigger defenses in the region. the u.s. this new administration is clearly doing a review what it wants to do with north korea but i think the obama administration has been very careful not to overreact on these type of missiles. maybe they kind of got a little bit nonchalant about it at a point. if you remember, last year at this time, sometimes you would see three or four of these missiles a month and sometimes

you would call up the state department officials and they would be like yeah, another day with north korea and didn't take it very seriously because that program is continuing to be perfected. but i do think there's a danger that the rhetoric doesn't get out of control. president trump is not someone who really kind of calibrates his rhetoric. i think it's very important that he didn't answer that question tonight. from that press pool. he wants to talk to his advisers, be briefed by secretary of defense mattis and national security team and secretary tillerson and get a plan in place. i think that's a very smart strategy and i think it shows that the realities of governing are very different than the rhetoric you hear on the campaign trail. this is clearly going to be one of president trump's biggest national security issues and they are going to have to decide what they want to do. the obama administration exercised what they called strategic patience and didn't want to do anything, they didn't

want to negotiate with north korea until it's ready to give up its nuclear program and some people think they delayed themselves into a very substantial north korean nuclear and missile program. they don't have the luxury of continuing to delay this any longer. demanders in the pacific have said that north korea could have an icbm within a year and as they continue to perfect their nuclear capability, that's a very dangerous trajectory. >> thanks to both of you for the information. again, just to recap what we're learning this evening here in the u.s., overseas this ballistic missile test happened at 7:55 local time there. we're still getting more information but we learned about it was about 500 kilometers that this ballistic missile traveled and ended up in the sea and it was not an intercontinental missile which we know north

korea has been working to develop but again have not fired any of those to that range or caliber up to this point. certainly the first test and international test of president trump's presidency as he continues his weekend meeting with the prime minister of japan here on a visit to the united states. so much more to learn about what's happening in north korea and still awaiting a response specific response from the president of the united states for our international review, we'll return to our regular programming up next is the cnn original series, the history of comedy. how's that for a turn? thank you for joining me. i'll be back tomorrow night at 5:00 eastern right here on cnn. have a great night. >> this is our point of view. there's an suv, make it one of the best in its clasp to those who know

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