PRESIDENT Biden’s warning that we face “Armageddon’ if Vladmir Putin uses nuclear weapons will only encourage the Russian president to become more paranoid.

That’s the view of the Former US intelligence officer Lt Col Anthony Shaffer
Speaking to GB News he said: “This is the first time in my memory, and I’ve been around since the 1980s, where the United States has not sought some level of diplomatic approach as a part of a strategy to essentially wind the war down.

“I think President Biden’s comments will only encourage Putin who’s already paranoid, to become even more paranoid. And I think when you examine the things that are going on, I think it’s in everybody’s interest to take a step back and try to step away from any language.

“ I just think it was very much the wrong move by President Biden.
“I don’t think this is the best time to be confronting Putin. With that said, I do believe that we need to do something to ratchet back his ability to continue offensive operations is just a direct confrontation with nuclear weapons I don’t think is the path to go at this point.
Mr Shaffer’s comments came after Ukraine’s President, Volodymyr Zelensky, said Russian officials have begun to “prepare their society” for the possible use of nuclear weapons, but added he does not believe Russia is ready to use them.

“You must use preventive kicks,” he said, referring to sanctions, “not attacks”.
In recent weeks, the Ukrainian army has recaptured large swathes of territory in a successful counter-offensive that has forced Russian troops to abandon long-held positions. In what Kyiv describes as Moscow’s response to its defeats, President Vladimir Putin has incorporated four partially occupied regions of Ukraine.
The annexations, widely dismissed as illegal, have raised fears of a possible escalation in the seven-month war. President Putin and other senior Russian officials have suggested that nuclear weapons – possibly smaller, tactical weapons – could be used to defend those areas, although Western officials say there has been no evidence Moscow is prepared to do so.

Speaking in English at the president’s office in Kyiv, President Zelensky said: “They begin to prepare their society. That’s very dangerous.

“They are not ready to do it, to use it. But they begin to communicate. They don’t know whether they’ll use or not use it. I think it’s dangerous to even speak about it.”
Then, in Ukrainian, he said through a translator: “What we see is that Russia’s people in power like life and thus I think the risk of using nuclear weapons is not that definite as some experts say, because they understand that there is no turning back after using it, not only the history of their country, but themselves as personalities.”

However, he denied having called for strikes on Russia during an online event on Thursday, saying the Ukrainian word he had used had been misunderstood.