s North Korea fires a blitz of missiles, the United States is sticking to a mixture of pressure and offers of dialogue but US policymakers are resigned that little they do is likely to change Pyongyang's course. 

Eager to avoid another global crisis alongside Russia's invasion of Ukraine, President Joe Biden's administration has focused on a more narrow goal of reassuring allies that the United States will defend them.

North Korea, whose leader Kim Jong Un met three times with Biden's predecessor Donald Trump but failed to reach a lasting accord, in recent days has fired a record number of missiles, and Western officials say Pyongyang has made preparations for a seventh nuclear weapons test.

"I don't think there is anything we can do to stop North Korea," said Sue Mi Terry, a former CIA analyst on Korean affairs who is now director of the Asia program at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars