Donald Trump accuses Hillary Clinton of ‘playing chicken’ with Russia’s nuclear arsenal

Hillary Clinton tells property tycoon he is Russia's 'puppet'

Donald Trump has accused Hillary Clinton of "playing chicken" with Russia and suggested her presidency would risk starting a nuclear war.

Speaking about Russian President Vladimir Putin during the third Presidential debate, Mr Trump said: “He has no respect for her. He has no respect for our president."

Ms Clinton has taken a strong stance on Russia in recent weeks following an escalation of Moscow-supported strikes on Aleppo and amid accusations that Russia hacked into the computers of the Democratic National Committee.

“And I’ll tell you what she’d in very serious trouble, because we have a country [Russia] with a tremendous numbers of nuclear warheads.

“18,000, by the way, where they [Russia] expanded and we didn’t. 18,000 nuclear warheads and she’s playing chicken.

"Putin, from everything I see, has no respect for this person."

Ms Clinton responded: "That’s because he’d rather have a puppet as the president of the United States. It’s pretty clear." She said Trump was willing to "spout the Putin line".

Mr Trump has taken a number of pro-Moscow positions, especially in his repeated criticism of Nato.

The property tycoon has been criticised for ignoring intelligence that Russia was behind the attacks on DNC computers.

During the debate, Trump said "I don't know Putin," but acknoweldged he "has said nice things" about him.

Later he said: "Our country is so outplayed by Putin [...] nobody can believe how stupid our leader is."