As they’ve stated, as long as the party survives 1/2 their population can die and it’s ok if their objectives with respect to the west are achieved. The main conundrum they faced when considering defeating the west was not having a nuclear exchange initiated if they released a biological weapon. It’s essentially a “last man standing” issue at this point from their point of view if this is part of some plan. Nukes ostensibly don’t get used because at this point they have reasonable international plausible deniability. At that point it becomes Who can hold their societal 💩 together while suffering through this and come out the other side as a functional society.
Now the US knows this isn’t some mistake, they will use nukes if the impact is great enough. That is the standard response to bioweapons. Because this seems to be hyped, I lean more towards a DS attempt to foment conflict. In any case this is serving the DS plan for ‘de-peopling’. There is no way that the US is uncertain of the origin or intent of this, 0 is gone, the weak response to this is gone as well if it goes to ,,,,.