Rep. Adam Kinzinger said Friday that the only way to diplomatically stop North Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile aspirations was with "a credible military option."
"This is indicative and imperative on us to say, 'We have to step up the pressure,'" Kinzinger, an Illinois Republican who sits on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told Jake Tapper on CNN. "Diplomatically, economically, yes.
"But you do that by having a credible military option. They're not good military options.
"This is not a good thing.
"We don't want to use the military option," he added. "It's next to the last worst-case scenario.
"But you have to have a credible military option to force the diplomatic instrument of power and the economic instrument of power to work."
Pyongyang's ninth missile test since President Donald Trump took office in January might have failed — but "each time one of these tests happen, it's actually really bad news," Kinzinger said.
"Every time they fire a missile and it fails, you learn what failed on it. Then, they fix that.
"They try it again until they have basically a flawless system."
Kinzinger, 39, an Air Force veteran who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, added that Trump's increased rhetoric toward North Korea was "actually pretty good.
"We're bringing to light the real issue that we haven't talked about for a long time, which is North Korea is right now in a nuclear position — where we did a Iran nuclear agreement to prevent Iran from getting to.
"They have a missile, a nuclear missile they can deliver on our allies or on us.
"We have to bring attention to that," he told Tapper. "That is how diplomacy works."