WASHINGTON: US President Joe Biden cautioned that if his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin utilized a tactical nuclear bomb to try and win the ongoing battle in Ukraine, the world may face an "Armageddon" in his most strident words about the prospect of nuclear war.

 Biden reportedly said that the world had come the closest to nuclear catastrophe in 60 years while speaking at a Democratic fundraiser in New York on Thursday. Since Kennedy and the Cuban missile crisis, he claimed, "we have not had to deal with the possibility of Armageddon." Regarding the Russian President, Biden observed, "We have a person I know very well."

"His military is, you might say, considerably underperforming, so he's not joking when he talks about probable use of tactical nuclear weapons or biological or chemical weapons." In an effort to dissuade the US and its allies from assisting Ukraine and supporting its resistance to the all-out Russian invasion began in February, Putin and his officials have repeatedly threatened to use Russia's nuclear arsenal.

As per reports, one concern is that he would try to halt Ukraine's counteroffensive in its tracks by using a short-range "tactical" nuclear bomb, forcing Kiev to talk and lose territory.

If Russia were to use a nuclear weapon, the US and its allies would be faced with a difficult decision regarding how to react. Most experts and former officials believe that if Washington used military force, it would most likely do so with conventional weapons in an effort to prevent a rapid escalation to an all-out nuclear war.

But on Thursday evening, Biden said: ""First time since the Cuban missile crisis, we have the threat of a nuclear weapon if in fact things continue down the path they are going," the president said. "I don't think there's any such thing as the ability to easily (use) a tactical nuclear weapon and not end up with Armageddon.

What is Putin's off-ramp, which we are attempting to identify? Where does he locate an exit? Where does he end up that he not only loses face but also a lot of power?" Putin, according to US intelligence agencies, has come to perceive loss in Ukraine as an existential threat to his regime, which he associates with an existential threat to Russia. This may conceivably legitimise the deployment of nuclear weapons in his view of the world.

Putin calls for economic action to soften sanctions

Russian evil will lose when our peace formula prevails: Zelensky

Why Vladimir Putin's Criticisms of Western Imperialism Are False?