In destructive power, the behemoths of the Cold War dwarfed the U.S. atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima. Washington’s biggest test blast was 1,000 times as large. Moscow’s was 3,000 times.
Fears are growing that if Vladimir Putin feels cornered, he might choose to detonate one of his smaller weapons breaking the taboo set 76 years ago after Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
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Military experts say a new generation of nuclear weapons has raised the risk that Mr. Putin might introduce less destructive atomic arms into the battlefields in and around Ukraine.