TWO vain, prickly, strutting loudmouths hurl colourful threats at each other. Were they hip-hop artists engaged in a rap battle, it might be entertaining. But since they both have nuclear weapons, it is not. At the UN General Assembly on September 19th President Donald Trump threatened to "totally destroy North Korea", a country of 25m, along with "Rocket Man"-its leader, Kim Jong Un. Mr Kim retorted that he would "surely and definitely tame the mentally deranged us dotard with fire". Meanwhile, the North Korean foreign minister raised the prospect of testing a thermonuclear bomb over the Pacific, and American strategic bombers made a show of force off North Korea's east coast. North Korea declared that tantamount to a declaration of war, and said that next time it might shoot them down.
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