The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that Trump administration officials are considering adopting a “bloody nose” strategy, in other words, they are preparing to strike a limited number of North Korean facilities if there is another provocative missile launch or nuclear detonation. The American retaliatory action would “illustrate the high price the regime could pay for its behavior,” the paper noted. “The hope would be to make that point without inciting a full-bore reprisal by North Korea.” Earlier, the reported the administration was “dramatically” increasing the tempo of its planning for such an action. There are many reasons why Kim Jong Un, his nose bloodied, would decide not Nonetheless, a preventive strike is an exceedingly bad idea. As an initial matter, some analysts are making the case the U.S. should attack even in the absence of a North Korean provocation. For instance, David Allan Adams, in the widely discussed “Limited Strikes on North Korea Are Past Due,” argues it is time to “escalate to deescalate” in order “to break the North Korean provocation cycle.” “Limited military action,” the former U.S. Navy captain wrote last month, “would serve the dual purpose of hampering North Korean nuclear progress and resetting the level…