President Trump: Seven ways the world has changed

A Donald Trump presidency has raised major security questions in Asia.

Not only did he shock China with comments on Taiwan before his inauguration, but his Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has spoken of blocking China's access to artificial islands it has been building in the South China Sea, prompting warnings of a "military clash" from a state-run newspaper.

Japan and South Korea have both been singled out by Mr Trump for relying too much on the US. He has even said they would benefit from having their own nuclear arsenals.

Then there is the region's renegade state, North Korea, which is currently developing its own nuclear weapons.

Mr Trump faces the task of curbing those ambitions, something that has eluded successive US leaders.

Under President Obama, the policy was called "strategic patience" - squeeze North Korea with sanctions, persuade others to do the same, particularly China, and wait it out.

But Mr Trump's Vice-President Mike Pence has now said the "era of strategic patience is over".

The administration says "all options are on the table" and Mr Trump's announcement that he was sending an "armada" of US warships towards the Korean peninsula raised the spectre of military action.

The move was met with defiance from North Korea's regime, which threatened "weekly" missile tests and warned of "all-out war".

But there was increased confusion just 10 days later when it emerged that the US Navy strike group, which Mr Trump said had been deployed towards the Korean peninsula, instead travelled in the opposition direction.

While the White House clarified the whereabouts of the ships and insisted they were on their way, Mr Trump returned his focus to pressuring China to take action.

"China is very much the economic lifeline to North Korea so, while nothing is easy, if they want to solve the North Korean problem, they will," he tweeted.

His next step is unknown, but the early attempts of this unpredictable president in tackling the world's most unpredictable state have already exposed a flashpoint that is likely to return in years to come.