• Washington and Pyongyang have exchanged heated words, but behind the North’s belligerence and defiant pursuit of nuclear weapons, some analysts see a leadership anxious to avoid a war it can’t win, and careful to leave itself a rhetorical escape route.

“They know how to calculate their stakes,” a security expert said of Pyongyang’s leaders. “They are not reckless.” According to one report, North Korean officials have reached out to Republican-linked analysts in Washington for help interpreting President Trump’s comments.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration continued its effort to isolate the nation, adding eight North Korean banks and 26 individuals. The blacklist hits North Koreans working in China, Russia, Libya and the United Arab Emirates.