Vladimir Putin has vowed Russia will go “to the end” in its war in Ukraine while offering a fresh nuclear warning towards the West.

Speaking in an chilling new interview following state visits to North Korea and Vietnam this week, the Russian leader suggested the Kremlin may review its doctrine for the use of nuclear weapons over perceived Western aggression.

Putin accused Kyiv’s allies of ratcheting up tensions by clearing the use of NATO weapons against targets in Russian territory.

The Kremlin leader, 71, also claimed Western nations were “lowering the threshold” for the use of nuclear devices against Russia, but provided no evidence to back up the accusation.

These supposed moves led him to conclude Russia must now consider updating its nuclear doctrine in nuclear escalation, he said, proclaiming ominously that the defeat of Moscow’s forces in Ukraine would mean “the end of Russia‘s statehood”.

“It means the end of the 1,000-year history of the Russian state,” he said before saying, rhetorically, “I think this is clear to everyone… Isn’t it better to go all the way, until the end?”

Putin also claimed that, despite the refusal of the US, UK and other Western partners to directly enter the conflict, they are “constantly raising the stakes and escalating the situation” around Ukraine.

The reclusive despot added that the countries “seem to think that at some point we will get scared.”

“But at the same time, they also say they want to achieve a strategic defeat of Russia on the battlefield,’ he said, adding that such an outcome would mean the end of the Russian state.

“And then the question arises: why should we be afraid? Isn’t it better to go all the way, until the end?” he asked. “This is elementary formal logic… I think that those [in the West] who think this way, and even more so those who say it, are making another big mistake.”

His death or glory rhetoric comes despite him promising last Friday to “immediately” order a cease-fire in Ukraine and start negotiations if Kyiv began withdrawing troops from the four regions annexed by Moscow in 2022 and renounced plans to join NATO. Kyiv flatly rejected it as an ultimatum by Putin to surrender more territory.

Putin also condemned was he said was Western allies’ willingness to deploy tactical nuclear weapons against Russia, despite all the threats throughout the conflict coming from Moscow.

Earlier this month, Putin declared that the West is wrong to proceed from the assumption that Russia will never use its atomic arsenal.

Putin pointed at the country’s nuclear doctrine that envisages the use of nuclear weapons in case of a threat to its sovereignty and territorial integrity. At the same time, he said he sees no current threat to Russia’s sovereignty that would warrant the use of nuclear weapons and emphasized that Moscow doesn’t need them to defeat Ukraine.

But the Russian leader has also warned that Russia could revise its nuclear doctrine if the situation changes. The current doctrine states that atomic weapons could be used in response to a nuclear strike or an attack with conventional forces that threaten “the very existence” of the Russian state.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Tuesday that the latest moves by the U.S. and its allies have raised the need for modifying the doctrine.

“There is a trend for further exacerbation of the situation, and the multiplying challenges resulting from unacceptable escalatory actions by the U.S. and its NATO allies raise the issue of how basic documents in the sphere of nuclear deterrence could be brought in closer conformity with the current needs,” Ryabkov said, according to Russian news agencies. He didn’t say how the nuclear doctrine could be changed.