WASHINGTON: The risk of Armageddon is the highest it has been since the early 1960s, President Joe Biden said Thursday night as Russian losses in Ukraine prompt Russian officials to discuss the possible use of tactical nuclear weapons.
“We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon since Kennedy and the Cuban Missile Crisis,” Biden said at a fundraiser in New York for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
In October 1962 the U.S. and the Soviet Union were seemingly on the verge of a nuclear conflict after the U.S. deployment of ballistic missiles in Turkey and Italy were countered by the Soviet deployment of similar missiles in Cuba.
The president said the Russia President Vladimir Putin, “a guy I know fairly well,” is not joking when he talks of using “nuclear or biological or chemical weapons.”
“I don’t think there is any such a thing as the ability to easily use a tactical nuclear weapon and not end up with Armageddon,” Biden said.
Speaking to Democratic donors, Biden said he and U.S. officials were still “trying to figure out Putin’s off-ramp” in Ukraine.
“Where does he find a way out?” Biden asked. “Where does he find himself in a position he does not not only lose face but lose significant power within Russia?”
The president reiterated that the U.S. would continue to support Ukraine.
Ukraine utilizing captured Russian tanks
Britain’s defense ministry said in an intelligence update posted on Twitter Friday that “Re-purposed captured Russian equipment makes up a large proportion of Ukraine’s military hardware.
Ukraine has likely captured at least 440 Russian Main Battle Tanks, and around 650 other armored vehicles since the invasion. Over half of Ukraine’s currently fielded tank fleet potentially consists of captured vehicles.”
The update said, “The failure of Russian crews to destroy intact equipment before withdrawing or surrendering highlights their poor state of training and low levels of battle discipline. With Russian formations under severe strain in several sectors and increasingly demoralized troops, Russia will likely continue to lose heavy weaponry.”
Ukrainian President Voldymyr Zelenskyy said in his daily address Thursday that “Since the beginning of October, more than half a thousand square kilometers have been liberated from the Russian occupiers in the Kherson region alone.”
In Ukraine on Thursday, a Ukrainian official said Russian shelling struck residential buildings in Zaporizhzhia, killing at least two people.
Oleksandr Starukh, the governor of the Zaporizhzhia region, posted on Telegram that five other people were trapped in rubble following the attack.
(VOA)
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