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By Lee Chi-dong
SEOUL, July 5 (Yonhap) -- Top South Korean and U.S. military commanders were united Wednesday in sending a tough warning message to North Korea for its long-range missile test.
"Self-restraint, which is a choice, is all that separates armistice and war," Gen. Vincent K. Brooks, commander of the U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) and the allies' Combined Forces Command, said in a joint statement with Gen. Lee Sun-jin, chairman of the South's Joint Chiefs of Staff.
They called it the Combined Statement on Alliance Response to the North's test-firing of what it claims to be an intercontinental ballistic missile. Pyongyang asserted that the test was successful.
Brooks took note of the allies' decision to stage a joint ballistic missile exercise earlier in the day in a show of force against the North.
As it shows, he added, "We are able to change our choice when so ordered by our alliance's national leaders. It would be a grave mistake for anyone to believe anything to the contrary."
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