"The U.S. has been talking to North Korea, and paying them extortion money, for 25 years. Talking is not the answer!" Trump tweeted, just days after North Korea launched a missile that flew over northern Japan.
It was not immediately clear what Trump meant by "extortion money," though previous administrations have tried to defuse nuclear tensions by offering the North Korean regime food and aid packages, some of it in exchange for Pyongyang's commitment to curb its nuclear programs -- promises that have always been broken.
The North Korean launch was "the first step of the military operation of the (North Korean military) in the Pacific and a meaningful prelude to containing Guam," North Korean state media said, doubling down on Pyongyang's threats in early August to strike the US territory, home to a large US military base.
Trump's chest thumping suggestion that some undefined action -- not talk -- is needed is just the latest signal sent by the President that seems to contradict the Cabinet officials most involved in finding a way to defuse a nuclear showdown in a region that's home to billions, vital to the global economy, and the location of strategic US military bases
While some US officials hint that it might be part of a good cop, bad cop effort to increase pressure on North Korea, one former US official said the administration's signals are too incoherent for that to be likely.
"The idea that this is part of a "good cop, bad cop" strategy seems to be an attempt to excuse the reality that the Trump administration is in chaos when it comes to North Korea," said Abraham Denmark, a former assistant secretary of defense for East Asia, who sees no coherent administration strategy on Pyongyang.
"If the President has made up his mind against talks with North Korea, that should be the end of the conversation," Denmark said. "This dramatically undercuts the State Department - any offer of talks to North Korea has zero credibility if the President is not on board."
And without a decision on whether talks will be pursued, "no diplomacy or military decision can be made," Denmark said. And he adds another thought. "The President's tweet left an obvious question go unanswered: if the President feels talks will not solve this issue, what does he believe will solve it?"
Trump spoke in early August of visiting "fire and fury" on North Korea if it so much as threatened the US -- which it promptly did. He issued that threat as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson continued to emphasize a "peaceful pressure" campaign aimed at systematically cutting off Pyongyang's sources of financial and diplomatic support.
"We do view it as a provocative act against the United States and our allies," Tillerson told "Fox News Sunday," after North Korea fired three short range missiles on Friday [Aug 25]. "We're going to continue our peaceful pressure campaign as I have described it, working with allies, working with China as well to see if we can bring the regime in Pyongyang...
Read More: Trump: 'Talking is not the answer' with North Korea