I think it would be worse than with Putin. We'd genuinely be a pariah state, at least for a while. (And rightly so!) But I don't think he has the balls to order it OR the juice to get anybody to follow that order, so...
The easiest scenario to get to is the ol' "nuke a bunch of empty desert to show you MEAN BUSINESS" plan, but even that is just...nah. It would still be a HUGE deal and wreck our standing for a good while. There would be loud calls for him to step down, etc. And it wouldn't DO anything for him.
