Trump launches feud with *South* Korea; 2 US troops die in Afghanistan; China vows anti-THAAD exercises; CNO plans his own fleet review; and just a bit more...

All over the map in 42 minutes with President Trump. “There is a chance that we could end up having a major, major conflict with North Korea. Absolutely," Trump told Reuters in an Oval Office interview published Thursday. "We'd love to solve things diplomatically but it's very difficult."

This won’t help: the State Department is planning to axe 2,300 U.S. diplomats and civil servants, about 9 percent of its U.S. employees, to accommodate Trump’s proposed 28.5 percent budget cut, Bloomberg reports.

The president also used the interview to start a feud with South Korea, telling Reuters that Seoul should “pay the cost of the U.S. THAAD anti-missile defense system, which he estimated at $1 billion." (More on the Chinese reaction to the THAAD deployment below.) As well, Trump said he “intends to renegotiate or terminate a U.S. free trade pact with South Korea because of a deep trade deficit with Seoul. Asked when he would announce his intention to renegotiate the pact, Trump said: 'Very soon. I’m announcing it now.' Predictably, this has sparked an outcry on South Korean social media, while its political leaders struggle to understand what just happened.

What else?

• Trump had lots of nice things to say about Chinese President Xi Jinping, as the White House looks to Beijing to add pressure on the North Korean regime. "I believe he is trying very hard,” Trump said. “He certainly doesn’t want to see turmoil and death. He doesn’t want to see it. He is a good man.”
• Speaking of allies: “Saudi Arabia has not treated us fairly, because we are losing a tremendous amount of money in defending Saudi Arabia,” Trump said.

We pause for a moment here to note that President Trump has often returned to two common themes when he speaks to reporters about foreign policy: “That he can re-negotiate a trade deal, and that they should pay for whatever U.S. defense he knows they have. It's his go-to,” said Defense News’ Aaron Mehta on Twitter.

• On the war against ISIS: “There is an end,” Trump said. “And it has to be humiliation."
• There were also a few, what we’ll call for lack of a better word, “lighter” exchanges, like telling Reuters he thought the job of U.S. president wouldn’t be that involved. “This is more work than in my previous life. I thought it would be easier," he said.
• And one more thing: Trump has a button on his desk he hits and has a can of Coke delivered to his desk. All that and more, starting here.

Happening today: SecState Rex Tillerson chairs a meeting of the UN Security Council “to tighten the implementation of sanctions and build international resolve to isolate North Korea so it eventually disarms,” AP reports.

Adds the Washington Post: “Tillerson is expected to appeal for more vigorous enforcement of international economic sanctions against North Korea over its nuclear weapons and long-range missile programs and raise the prospect of additional economic and diplomatic punishment in response to any further provocations.”

BLUF: “Although the council is not voting on new sanctions or other measures Friday, the Trump administration hopes for a show of force with the entire council, including China, Russia, and the United States, coming together to air concerns about North Korea’s behavior.” More from WaPo, here.

From Defense One

There Is a Peaceful Way Out of the North Korea Crisis // Larry Diamond: Kim Jong Un's nuclear and missile programs represent one of the most dangerous challenges since the end of the Cold War. But there are opportunities to stop it.

America's Security Clearance System Is Broken, Former Spy Chief Clapper Says // Joseph Marks: The problem won't be easy to fix, but it could benefit from better employee monitoring and 'some very aggressive creative and sensitive education.'

Normalizing Illegal Action May Be the Only Lasting Effect of Trump's Syria Strike // Garrett Epps: A president has broad leeway to send American forces into harm's way, but Trump has blown past the few constraints that remain.

The Global Business Brief: April 27 // Marcus Weisgerber: Interesting finds in earnings reports; More details about US bomb shortage; Boeing loves Capitals hockey, and more.

How Trump Could Get China's Help on North Korea // Peter Beinart: Beijing is not going to pressure Pyongyang just because he tells them to.

Welcome to this Friday edition of The D Brief by Ben Watson and Bradley Peniston. #OTD1789: Fletcher Christian sets Capt. William Bligh adrift in the south Pacific. Got tips? Email us at the-d-brief@defenseone.com. (And if you’re reading this on our website, consider subscribing. It’s free.)

Two U.S. troops were killed in Afghanistan and a third was wounded in a firefight near the site of the MOAB strike in eastern Nangarhar province, the Pentagon announced Thursday. "The deaths occurred as U.S. and Afghan forces were conducting a raid against a prison where Islamic State kept civilians as prisoners, said Attaullah Khogyani, a spokesperson for the Nangarhar governor's office," LA Times reports. "There now have been three U.S. service members  killed fighting Islamic State in Afghanistan in 2017 -- all in Nangarhar."

China’s defense ministry vows live-fire drills and weapons tests as its response to the THAAD anti-missile system deployed in Korea, the South China Morning Post reported Thursday. “Beijing-based military analyst Li Jie said Yang’s comments were meant to remind the US and South Korea that China could take measures, including ‘hard and soft kill’ weapons, to destroy the THAAD system. ‘China can use its traditional Dongfeng series short and medium-range missiles as hard-kill weapons in case there is a war,’ Li said. ‘For soft-kill, it means it’s possible that Beijing may try using electromagnetic pulse warheads as well as electronic interference technologies to disrupt the radar system of THAAD.’” More here.

Fleet size—it’s just a number. Since then-President-elect Donald Trump and later the U.S. Navy called for a 355-ship fleet, we’ve heard from a number of experts about what it would take to realize that goal. Stay tuned for the service’s two cents: Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Richardson told a D.C. crowd yesterday he’d be publishing a plan outlining the Navy’s future in broad strokes in the coming weeks.  
Until then, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has your cost breakdown, or go back to the Navy’s newest Force Structure Assessment that introduced that number at the end of last year.

Nice work, if you can get it. “In September 2016, two Army intelligence officers set out on a cross-country expedition across Bulgaria to explore its rich history, its communist past, and what these can tell us about ongoing Russian influence in the NATO member state,” writes West Point’s Modern War Institute previewing a #LongRead on the “Ghosts of Soviets Past,” from Reserve officers Will DuVal and Adam Maisel.

What DuVal and Maisel discovered on numerous stops—in between meals of rabbit stew, rakia and Bulgarian red wine: “Unlike the Baltic States where public perception of Russia is haunted by memories of occupation, Bulgarians tend to look more favorably on their Slavic neighbor despite hardships during the Soviet era...complicating security matters, Bulgaria and many of its neighbors still rely on Russia for military parts for maintenance of their older equipment. Bulgaria’s continued reliance exposes a crucial weakness if its military is ever required to take up arms against neighboring Russia.”

Their BLUF: A path forward should include “continued development projects, sustained NATO cooperation (including support to de-Russifying Bulgaria’s military hardware), and support for anti-corruption agencies may deny Russia many of the levers—so apparent in the monuments, infrastructure, and other symbols that dot Bulgaria’s landscape—it seeks to manipulate.” Read their account in full, here.

How can the U.S. counter the Russian military’s growing interest in pre-emptive conflict? CNAS’s Alexander Velez-Green has at least 15 ideas in a much longer take on the topic, here.

The Israelis fired a Patriot missile at an incoming drone as it crossed into the Golan Heights from Syria, AP reported Thursday. In light of this, it’s hard not to think of this story from March when U.S. Army TRADOC Commander, Gen. David Perkins, told a conference “how a US ally recently shot down a $200 consumer drone with a Patriot Missile.” That story of overkill, here.

The Islamic State group’s newest contraption: removing the roofs of ambulances in West Mosul to turn them into boats ready to be loaded with explosives. Photos, here.

President Trump’s VA-centric executive order wins praise from the American Legion. About that EO, USA Today reports it “creates a new office at the VA that will investigate allegations of misconduct – including retaliation against whistle-blowing employees who reported abuses — and seek to identify systemic barriers that have previously hindered the agency's top leaders from more adequately addressing such problems in the past, including with disciplinary action.”

The American Legion’s Media Director (and former aide to Gen. Dunford), Joe Plenzler flagged his organization’s recent efforts to call “upon the U.S. Congress to enact legislation to provide the VA Secretary the authority to remove any individual from the department that warrants for removal or to transfer poorly performing individuals to other general schedule positions without any increase in pay or benefits. We applaud the Secretary’s quick action in addressing significant deficiencies recently exposed at the Washington, DC VA Medical Center,” Plenzler said.

And to that end, the AL is holding a veterans’ town hall at the Washington, D.C. VA Medical Center auditorium on May 3 at 7 p.m. EDT. “We encourage all veterans receiving care at this center to come and let their voices be heard,” said Plenzler. Details, here.

Lastly today: What’s the fourth-worst job in America? An enlisted servicemember (taking last year’s number four spot from disc jockeys), according to a recent report from CareerCast, Military Times reports. “Beyond money, the likely driver for the low position is stress level: Enlisted troops were second in the website's  2016 list of most stressful jobs, just ahead of generals.” Numbers one, two and three on the 2017 list? Newspaper reporters, broadcasters and loggers—all three staying in the top five for at least the past three years. 2017 full list, here.