For the past few months, North Korea’s nuclear missile program has dominated headlines — and for good reason. Just last week, North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong-ho said war with the United States was inevitable, and many people criticized Trump for provoking these kinds of comments. Trump’s behavior on Twitter and his casual instigation is inexcusable, but regardless of how anyone feels about Trump, it is clear that North Korea is a problem that must be acknowledged and dealt with.

Trump addressed the United Nations on Sept. 19, saying “the United States has great strength and patience, but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea.” As much as I disagree with Trump’s Twitter antics and his way of responding to the aggression of North Korea, I think a lot of the criticism he faces is unfair.

Accepting North Korea as a nuclear power is dangerous at worst, and appeasement at best. Why should we allow anything less than nuclear disarmament for a nation that has repeatedly violated United Nations sanctions and disrespected international law? If North Korea wanted diplomacy they would have obeyed United Nations sanctions instead of firing an intercontinental ballistic missile over Japan. Additionally, waiting and doing nothing only allows North Korea to build up a bigger nuclear stockpile, while its arsenal right now could possibly be thwarted by nuclear countermeasures.

This strategy of appeasing North Korea is both dangerous and shockingly similar to the attitude many people had toward Germany shortly before World War II. Like North Korea, Nazi Germany held unchecked aggression for its neighbors and committed blatant human rights violations through the operation of concentration camps. A 1941 Gallup poll found that prior to Pearl Harbor, 88 percent of people surveyed were against joining in the war.

This quickly changed after the attack at Pearl Harbor, but it raises the question of why so few people were concerned with what was happening in Germany prior to that. Of course, many did not know the true extent of Hitler’s concentration camps, but there was almost certainly an isolationist idea held by the public that kept leaders from acting. Viewing the problematic regime of North Korea as “not our problem” will only work for so long.

I am not calling for war with North Korea. War is a tragedy that should be avoided at all costs. However, I think it is important to recognize the gravity of the situation we are faced with: a situation in which a country that starves and kills its own people has access to weapons of mass destruction and the capability to perform an intercontinental strike. Additionally, they have no intention to obey any agreements that almost the entire world has come to, in order to preserve peace and the future of mankind. In his address to the United Nations, Trump said “[he] will always put America first. Just like [they], as the leaders of [their] countries, will always and should always put [their] countries first.” At what point do we decide North Korea is a problem that needs to be addressed? What happens when North Korea strikes first?

Looking back, there’s no question that we should have joined the war effort against Nazi Germany sooner. I don’t think that the North Korean regime is comparable to Germany under Adolf Hitler. However, two things are clear: North Korea is not going to stop manufacturing nuclear weapons, and they’re not going to start listening to the United Nations.

Why should we allow such a dangerous and unpredictable nation to possess weapons that have the capability to end the world? If North Korea is allowed to continue stockpiling nuclear weapons they will soon be able to operate as they please without fear of consequence, for the United States (or the United Nations for that matter) will not be able to keep them in check without ending the world. The idea that we should simply sit back and accept North Korea as a nuclear power is nothing more than appeasement in the hopes that they will alter their destructive behavior — and this will have major repercussions.