Trump has stated he will cut American aid to Ukraine, which makes a majority of total aid. Recently Zelensky stated that if Ukraine’s only hope for sovereignty is its own nuclear arsenal, they will build it.
Trump has stated he will cut American aid to Ukraine, which makes a majority of total aid. Recently Zelensky stated that if Ukraine’s only hope for sovereignty is its own nuclear arsenal, they will build it.
The irony is that Ukraine had “the bomb”, but the US and its allies promised to protect them if they gave it up. Oops.
The US and Russia. Ya know, the Russia that’s murdering, raping, and torturing Ukrainians and claiming they shouldn’t exist like genocide
This is like saying that Germany has the right to keep the American nukes stationed on its soil if the US was to ever leaver Germany.
The soviet bombs were built, operated and guarded by a Russian department of the Russian Republic member of the Soviet union. what Ukraine signed on was a smooth repatriation of those nukes back to Russian. there is no real way Ukraine could have confiscated them even if they tried.
Giving up nukes, and remaining neutral, is also the conditions for their liberation granted by USSR/Russia. Germany asking US to end its occupation is going to need the US to be allowed to take their weapons for them to agree peacefully.
Since I see this claim constantly: where in the Budapest memorandum did they promise protection?
Looking at the Wikipedia summary nowhere does anyone give security assurances similar to NATO article 5 or the even stronger worded mutual defense clause article 42 TEU of the EU. The closest it comes to is in the fourth point, but that is only in the case of nuclear weapons being used. Which obviously hasn’t happened yet. Beyond that it is just a promise not to attack, which Russia has broken, but every other singator has kept. And as far as I can see it does not contain anything that compells others to act on someone else’s breach.
"A resolution passed by the Rada, the Ukrainian parliament, on Nov. 18, 1993, attached conditions to its ratification of START that Russia and the United States deemed unacceptable. Those stated that Ukraine would only dismantle 36 percent of its delivery vehicles and 42 percent of its warheads; all others would remain under Ukrainian custody. Moreover, the resolution made those reductions contingent upon assurances from Russia and the United States to never use nuclear weapons against Ukraine (referred to as “security assurances”), along with foreign aid to pay for dismantlement.
In response, the Clinton and Yeltsin administrations intensified negotiations with Kyiv, eventually producing the Trilateral Statement, which was signed on Jan. 14, 1994. This agreement placated Ukrainian concerns by allowing Ukraine to cooperate in the transfer of the weapons to Russia, which would take place over a maximum period of seven years. The agreement further called for the transferred warheads to be dismantled and the highly enriched uranium they contained to be downblended into low-enriched uranium. Some of that material would then be transferred back to Ukraine for use as nuclear reactor fuel. Meanwhile, the United States would give Ukraine economic and technical aid to cover its dismantlement costs. Finally, the United States and Russia responded to Ukraine’s security concerns by agreeing to provide security assurances upon its NPT accession.
In turn, the Rada ratified START, implicitly endorsing the Trilateral Statement. However, it did not submit its instrument of accession to the NPT until Dec. 5, 1994, when Russia, the United Kingdom, France, and the United States provided security assurances to Ukraine. That decision by the Rada met the final condition for Russia’s ratification of START and therefore subsequently brought that treaty into force.
For more information, see Ukraine, Nuclear Weapons and Security Assurances at a Glance."
https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/lisbon-protocol-glance
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No protection, just non-agression. That was violated by russia.
And that was the issue of the memorandum - it should’ve included something akin to Article 5
Russia would have never signed on to that. Their whole argument about Ukraine is the constant advancement of NATO territories towards its border.
That’s the lesson here… They gave up their nuclear weapons for nothing.
Zero benefit to the people