If North Korea follows through on its threat to fire missiles on Guam, "obviously, we should try to shoot them down," Sen. Ed Markey said Wednesday.
"To make sure that no damage is done to our personnel or any citizen of Guam," the Massachusetts Democrat told Wolf Blitzer on CNN. "But what we should do is try to avoid that from ever happening in the first place."
Pyongyang said Thursday it would develop a plan by the middle of the month to launch four intermediate range missiles at Guam before presenting it to dictator Kim Jong Un.
Kim then would decide whether to proceed, the state-run KCNA news agency said.
Guam is a U.S. Pacific territory located 2,131 miles southeast of North Korea.
Markey, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told Blitzer of former President John Kennedy's adage when dealing with foreign powers: "We should never negotiate out of fear, but we should never fear to negotiate."
"I hope and pray to God that it's not too late," he said.
"The president should change his tactic, move towards dialogue, allow for a negotiation to open up, send Secretary [of State Rex] Tillerson to the negotiating table so that we can de-escalate the rhetoric and the possibility that military action could be commenced.
"There is no military solution to this problem that does not result in catastrophe."
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