North Korea's ability to fire a nuclear warhead at the U.S. will soon become an accepted reality, former Defense Secretary Robert Gates told CNBC on Tuesday. "I think that over the coming year, you'll see North Korea become accepted as having the capability to launch an intercontinental ballistic missile with a nuclear warhead on it to the United States. A lot of people already believe that they have that capability," he said. Gates' comments come amid high tensions between the U.S. and North Korea as the regime of Kim Jong Un continues missile launches and nuclear tests despite international warnings to desist. North Korea sees the weapons as a way to defend itself against attack or attempts to overthrow Kim. There is widespread concern that North Korea is close to being able to mount nuclear warheads on its missiles — but this has not been independently verified. Gates, a former CIA director who was Pentagon secretary in the second Bush and Obama administrations, had no expectations that North Korea would suddenly give up its nuclear ambitions ahead of any discussions to de-escalate .

A man watches a TV news showing file footage of a North Korean missile launch at a railway station in Seoul on April 28, 2016. Jung Yeon-Je | AFP | Getty Images

"If the precondition for any negotiation is a statement or an affirmation by the North Koreans that they're going to give up their nuclear programs, then we're going nowhere," he said. Speaking to CNBC at the Arab Strategy Forum in Dubai, Gates said the key was to initiate negotiations that first of all "minimizes the threat of an incipient crisis and then begins to alleviate the tensions somewhat." Gates suggested that a way to start negotiations was to get North Korea to agree a "freeze" on the testing of both nuclear weapons and missiles "and then the beginning of a negotiation that over time could lead to a denuclearized Korean Peninsula." "But anyone that thinks we're going to jump right to that is being very unrealistic," he said. "So the question is how do you keep tensions under control while that process plays out."

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