"North Korea seeks the capability to kill millions of Americans with nuclear weapons," the document reads. "North Korea is also pursuing chemical and biological weapons which could also be delivered by missile."

The US is deploying a layered missile defense system with a focus on North Korea and Iran to defend the homeland from missile attacks, it also says. That system includes the ability to defeat missile threats prior to launch.

North Korea is cast as a country that starves its own people but has spent "hundreds of millions of dollars" on nuclear, chemical and biological weapons that could threaten the US.

"Continued provocations by North Korea will prompt neighboring countries and the United States to further strengthen security bonds and take additional measures to protect themselves," the strategy says. "US allies are critical to responding to mutual threats, such as North Korea, and preserving our mutual interests in the Indo-Pacific region."

It adds, "Our alliance and friendship with South Korea, forged by the trials of history, is stronger than ever."

The US will work with allies and partners to achieve complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and move toward an "area defense capability" with South Korea and Japan in missile defense, it says.

"We remain ready to respond with overwhelming force to North Korean aggression and will improve options to compel denuclearization of the peninsula," says the document.

Tensions have escalated in the wake of North Korea's recent weapons tests, including its most powerful nuclear detonation in September and last month's launch of a new ballistic missile apparently capable of reaching anywhere in the US.

Trump has previously threatened to "totally destroy" the regime if necessary, but others within the administration have stressed that it still prefers a diplomatic solution to the crisis.

South Korea's unification ministry said that the document showed the international community is on the same pace over the need to employ sanctions and pressure to prod North Korea into coming to the negotiation table.

"The government has kept the stance that North Korea's nuclear issue should be peacefully resolved, and we need to apply sanctions and pressure to make Pyongyang give up its nukes and come to dialogue. In that sense, the international community is moving in the same direction," a ministry official said. (Yonhap)