Yesterday, the UN Security Council passed a new resolution condemning North Korea for launching an IRBM over northern Japan.

On the one hand, this was a major accomplishment for the United States. Two of North Korea’s patrons, China and Russia, signed on. The resolution called for an end to North Korea’s ballistic missile program and demanded its nuclear program be shuttered under IAEA inspection. On the other hand, China, as usual, insisted on a linkage of US mutual defense activities with South Korea and a return to some kind of talks to this belligerent saber rattling by North Korea. As this was passed as a “president’s resolution,” and because North Korea has basically been sanctioned until there are no sanctions left to impose, no action accompanied the resolution.

Before the vote Nikki Haley gave an brief press conference:

Key comments via Daily Caller:

“They have violated every single UN Security Council resolution,” Haley said. “I think enough is enough,” she further remarked, using a common phrase which has used regularly for a number of persistent global problems.

“No country should have missiles flying over them like those 130 million people in Japan. It’s unacceptable,” she added. “I think something serious has to happen.” Haley also expressed a strong desire to see China and Russia do much more to rein in North Korea.

The UN Security Council will meet Tuesday afternoon to discuss its options. “We are going to talk about what else is left to do to North Korea,” Haley told reporters.

This is pretty strong stuff.

The problem facing the UN is how to act on North Korea. I suspect it will do nothing as both Russia and China, while perhaps wanting to mitigate North Korea’s high risk behavior, are both perfectly happy with his antics causing difficulties for the US, South Korea, and Japan. Talking has been shown to do nothing. Economic relief accomplished nothing. But diplomatic action will continue. I suspect more Chinese and other companies are going to be hit with sanctions this coming week. Hopefully, this will convince China it has a vested interest in regime change in Pyongyang. Otherwise we are headed for war. No American president is going to be able to sit idly by while North Korea develops an ICBM and a miniaturized nuke that can strike the continental United States because that view has no constituency in American politics.