"This is the land of lousy options... You can choose between bad, worse and the worst," former diplomat Victor Cha told a group of fellow analysts.

After this week's deadly artillery attack on a South Korean island, the United States faces three options: resume negotiations with North Korea, which would be seen as rewarding its latest provocation; ease up on the tone of the response and perhaps risk a new shocker from Pyongyang; or toughen its stance and face the prospect of an armed escalation on the Korean peninsula.

Obama was briefed several times Wednesday on the developing situation in the Korean peninsula and his administration is working around the clock on the issue, the White House told AFP.

During his 2008 election campaign, Obama was more conciliatory than his Republican rival John McCain in vowing a more open policy toward Pyongyang.

A few months after he took office, however, he changed his tune after North Korea tested a missile and broke off six-party talks with China, Japan, Russia, the United States and South Korea.

Washington has since refused to negotiate directly with Pyongyang until it resumes its participation in the six-party talks.

Cha, who served in the White House under Obama's predecessor George W. Bush from 2004 to 2007, said previous US administrations faced the same dilemma with North Korea. He advised resuming negotiations one more time, and hope for the best.

Two other Bush-era diplomats disagree, saying that resuming negotiations would be "a colossal mistake."

After a long history of failed US policy toward Pyongyang since the 1990s, "the focus right now should be on containment, interdiction and pressure," Michael Green and William Tobey wrote in The Wall Street Journal.

Christopher Hill, a top US negotiator on North Korean policy from 2005 to 2009, said "options are never very good when one considers this issue."

The former US ambassador opposes direct negotiations with Pyongyang, which would "marginalize" US ally South Korea and "let the Chinese off the hook," when he believes they hold the key to the crisis.

Speaking an interview with AFP, Hill said Beijing's cautious approach toward North Korea stems from internal strife between supporters of China's traditional and unconditional support for its neighbor and other sectors concerned with the direction North Korea is taking.

"The more we pressure the Chinese, the better," he added.

The US State Department took a step in that direction on Wednesday when it called on China to be as clear as the United States in its reaction to the attack, and use its "influence to reduce tensions."

"Staying close to South Korea is rule number one," he stressed.

"We don't want to be perceived as underreacting to their problem, but we also don't want to be perceived as not worrying about their concern about conflict."

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