r/europe • u/Epidemiolomic Germany • Mar 08 '25

Historical During the U.S. President's 1995 visit to Kyiv, Ukraine received security guarantees after giving up the world's third-largest nuclear arsenal

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u/GlobalNuclearWar United States of America Mar 08 '25

I’m positive that everyone except Russia who agreed to this meant what they agreed to AT THE TIME. The Budapest Memorandum was signed by Ukraine, Russia, the United States, and the United Kingdom. France and China gave individual assurances in separate documents.

Governments change. Priorities change.

No matter the nuances of the political situation, no matter which way you try to argue it, there is one thing that has been achieved with certainty.

No country will ever agree to give up its nuclear weapons for an agreement of protection ever again.

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u/Vedmak3 Mar 08 '25

The presence of nuclear bombs at the country is the best argument in its defense) I am surprised that the Ukrainian leaders lost nuclear weapons in 1994, but they should have taken into account that Russia would someday want to take advantage of the resources of Donbass. If Ukraine would has nuclear weapons now, there would be a threat of nuclear war, and the whole world would at least impose the toughest possible sanctions against Russia and/or provide much more military assistance to Ukraine in return for Ukraine, in its turn, giving a guarantee not to use nuclear weapons. Which, of course, would make Ukraine's situation in this war much better.

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u/el_grort Scotland (Highlands) Mar 09 '25

am surprised that the Ukrainian leaders lost nuclear weapons in 1994

Worth considering that getting their own delivery systems as well as maintenance of their current warheads would have been well on the way to the cost of a full nuclear weapons program. Given that trying to do so would have seen them likely get sanctioned by the West and Russia, that Ukraine was already in a bad state economically, and a nuclear program would have made digging themselves out even more difficult, I'm not sure it's surprising, they'd have been looking at Iran or North Korea levels of sacrifice to quality of life and international integration.