Is North Korea different from the Soviet Union? Of course. Is anyone comfortable with the fact that North Korea is building nuclear-tipped missiles that can hit the United States? Of course not. But the point is: We’ve lived with such threats before, and there is simply no reason to believe that the deterrent capabilities we’ve had in place to prevent North Korea from attacking South Korea and American forces there since the end of the Korean War will not continue to work. North Korea’s ruling Kim family is homicidal, but it has not survived for three generations by being suicidal. And firing a nuclear missile at us would be suicide.

What we should be doing is actually laughing at their missile tests — telling them we think they’re pathetic — while maintaining our deterrence, steadily improving and deploying our antiballistic missile capabilities to defend the United States homeland, as well as American forces in the region and our Japanese and South Korean allies. We should also bombard North Korea’s people with information on how poor they are compared with the rest of the world — while generating ever tighter economic sanctions and embargoes so the North Korean regime sees that its choice is very simple: It can have either nuclear weapons or endless poverty that will eventually sap its strength from within.

I repeat, time is on our side. As Bader notes, North Korea is “a foe with one strength and many profound and eventually fatal weaknesses.” Let’s treat it that way: Deter its strength and exacerbate its weaknesses by being smart, not hysterical.

How? The best place to start is by putting on the table a clear, formal peace proposal so the world — especially South Korea and China — see that America is not the problem. The more the whole world sees us as the solution and not as a country led by someone just as crazy, irrational and unstable as North Korea, the more leverage we will have.

What should the American proposal say? It should tell the North Koreans, says Bader, that in return for their complete denuclearization and dismantling of their missile program, we would establish full diplomatic relations; end the economic embargo and sanctions; and provide economic assistance, investment and a peace treaty to replace the 64-year-old armistice agreement. “Each side could commit to those objectives at the outset, with the timeline and key implementing framework to be negotiated,” he added. “There would be nothing in such an agreement that would be contrary to U.S. national security interests, and it would provide to North Korea the security that it claims justifies its nuclear weapons programs.”

It’s called the art of the deal.

It is most unlikely that North Korea would accept such a proposal. Its leader is obsessed, at least for now, with protecting his regime with nuclear missiles. But this overture, Bader notes, would “demonstrate to the South Korean government, and to its president, Moon Jae-in, that Washington is prepared to put an attractive offer on the table, since Moon is seeking avenues for reconciliation with the North. Moon could be given a leading role in trying to persuade Pyongyang to accept such a proposal. If Pyongyang refuses, as is likely, Moon will be more likely to support a serious containment and deterrence strategy.”