The world will need to get used to North Korea having nuclear weapons for now, according to a former top US intelligence advisor currently visiting Australia.

Gregory Treverton was the chairman of the powerful US National Intelligence Council until he stood down in January, and today said the US may need to back down a bit to avoid conflict.

"We have got to find a way to avoid [war] … That means climbing down on our side," he told News Breakfast.

"It means, over time, I think [it will be] very, very hard for us, but to recognise those North Korean nuclear weapons aren't going to go away.

"The best thing we can try and do is cap them, contain them."

After a week of rising tensions and threats, US President Donald Trump this week praised North Korean leader Kim Jong-un for a "wise and well reasoned" decision not to fire missiles towards Guam.

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However, Mr Treverton said the threat of war had by no means passed.

"I'm glad the North Koreans climbed down a bit from their plan to send missiles to Guam, but it's still easy to imagine a miscalculation that would get us in a place we certainly don't want to be," he said.

"It really is very dangerous. Imagine the two of them, both of them narcissists by temperament.

"The plain fact is there is no good military option."



According to Mr Treverton a pre-emptive attack by the US against North Korea was not a feasible option.

He said North Korea had been building hidden facilities and moving its missiles around. And even if the US could target its nuclear facilities, it would still have non-nuclear options that could devastate South Korean targets.

Trump's diplomacy is 'erratic'

Mr Treverton said Mr Trump had "painted himself into a corner" after ramping up his threats towards North Korea and that his approach to foreign policy was "really quite erratic".

"I came to realise that almost nothing he says has any content," Mr Treverton said.

"It's really attention, self-aggrandisement, upsetting the apple cart."

Sorry, this video has expired Donald Trump says if anything happens to Guam there will be "big, big trouble"

He said key personnel like Secretary of Defence James Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson were tyring to guide Mr Trump, but the President's use of Twitter made that hard.

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"It is something I never expected to see in my lifetime in my country," Mr Treverton said.

"There's a lot of frustration. We've seen lots of people leaving the State Department.

"My worry is not that people leave en masse but that it will be very hard to attract the next generation.

"If you are an intelligence analysist, you pay a huge price in terms of your personal life to do that job, and if you are not appreciated, who'd do it?"