[throw-the-towel]

Those were Soviet nukes, physically located in Ukraine but not controlled by it, same as any French/US nukes stationed in Germany would not make it a nuclear state.

The ones in Ukraine got moved into Russia, in exchange for Ukraine receiving money and security guarantees.

[Tuna-Fish]

> Those were Soviet nukes, physically located in Ukraine but not controlled by it, same as any French/US nukes stationed in Germany would not make it a nuclear state.

This is not an accurate comparison.

It's not that Russia had nukes in Ukraine and withdrew them. Many of the Soviet soldiers manning them were Ukrainians and stayed behind. Much of the infrastructure for maintaining the Soviet arsenal was also in Ukraine and had to be rebuilt in Russia. The situation was more akin to if the US broke up and Louisiana (which has a lot of nuclear warheads stationed in it) is dealing with whether they are now a nuclear power, or if they need to hand them over to South Carolina or something.

[selimthegrim]

Ukraine had multiple Long-Range Aviation bases in it, Louisiana only has one (Barksdale near Shreveport)

[nwellnhof]

> It's not that Russia had nukes in Ukraine and withdrew them.

Russia is the single legal successor of the USSR, so all Soviet nukes became Russian nukes, regardless where they were located. So after the USSR broke up, Russia did have nukes in Ukraine and withdrew them.

[dragonwriter]

Legal succession is mostly irrelevant and more complicated than that. Russia had operational control because it had taken physical control of the ex-Soviet command and control systems which were in Russia, and hence had the launch codes, etc.

[throw-the-towel]

To be fair, Russia becoming the single successor of the USSR wasn't a foregone conclusion in the early 1990s. There wasn't relevant precedent of a country dissolving I think -- Yugoslavia was still battling it out, Austria-Hungary was too long ago.

[int_19h]

It was an explicit decision by both CIS and UN. Russia took USSR's seat on UNSC two weeks after USSR was dissolved, and that happened in 1991. Budapest Memorandum was negotiated 3 years later, by which time this was already a firmly established thing.

[overfeed]

> Those were Soviet nukes, physically located in Ukraine but not controlled by it, same as any French/US nukes stationed in Germany would not make it a nuclear state

It's not quite the same, since Ukraine was part of the USSR, and Ukrainian scientists, engineers, and tradesmen contributed to the effort. Germany, on the other hand, was never part of the American federation, and didn't contribute to American weapons development...since Wernher von Braun/Operation Paperclip.

[_djo_]

Indeed. There was even a question of whether they could legally be considered Ukrainian or Russian weapons, regardless of where the command centre was. To solve that while the talks were ongoing they set up a ‘joint’ command centre in Moscow with ex-SSR countries theoretically sharing joint control over the weapons with Moscow.

Ukraine at one point wanted to formally claim ownership over the weapons, as after all breaking the permissive action locks wasn’t that difficult. The US talked them out of it, as a lead up to the Budapest Memorandum.

We all know how much the security guarantees of that agreement were worth.

[VWWHFSfQ]

> We all know how much the security guarantees of that agreement were worth.

They were worth 30 years of peace. It wasn't a treaty. Everyone knew it was a handshake agreement without consequences for breaking it. It prevented an immediate war in eastern Europe after the fall of the USSR. A war that could have been much worse involving nuclear weapons.

Unfortunately the war came 30 years later.

[_djo_]

20 years, not 30, and not even that. There were other clashes plus massive Russian interference in Ukrainian affairs just a few years after Budapest.

For something as serious as giving up a nuclear arsenal it’s reasonable to expect to get more than 20 years of peace and for the co-signers to actual fulfil their parts of the agreement, whether legally binding or not.

The end result is that no country will soon trust a Russian non-aggression promise and none will trust an American promise of support.

[VWWHFSfQ]

It was signed in 1994? That's 30 years. I guess you're counting Crimea? I was think just starting from the full Russian invasion.

[_djo_]

Russia invaded and annexed Crimea and invaded eastern Ukraine in 2014. That’s 20 years later.

It is also widely believed to have had a hand in the poisoning of Viktor Yushchenko with dioxin in 2004, in order to give an edge to his pro-Russian opponent, Viktor Yanukovych.

But even if that’s not true there’s ample evidence of overt Russian influence campaigns to support Yanukovych in that election, which was just 10 years after the Budapest Memorandum.

[insane_dreamer]

Thanks. Did that happen immediately after the USSR breakup, i.e., when Yeltsin was in charge, or more recently under Putin?

[throw-the-towel]

Still under Yeltsin, 1994 I think. If you've heard about the Budapest Memorandum, that's exactly what it was about.

[guerby]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_Memorandum

Signed 5 December 1994

1. Respect the signatory's independence and sovereignty in the existing borders (in accordance with the principles of the CSCE Final Act).[10]

2. Refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of the signatories to the memorandum, and undertake that none of their weapons will ever be used against these countries, except in cases of self-defense or otherwise in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations. (...)

[brabel]

The same article says the US itself claimed the Memorandum was not legally binding when it sanctioned Belarus. And the Analysis section starts with a clear:

The Budapest Memorandum is not a treaty, and it does not confer any new legal obligations for signatory states.

It also states that many Ukrainians at the time considered that keeping the nukes was an unrealistic option since all maintenance and equipment required to maintain them were located in Russia, Ukraine was under a financial crisis at the time and had no means to develop those things itself. I just can’t understand people now claiming it was a mistake to give up the nukes. Russia might have reasonably invaded Ukraine as soon as it was clear they intended to keep them as they knew they didn’t really have the ability to use them and no Western government would support them using them and starting a war that would likely contaminate half of Europe and cause terrible loss of life. It was absolutely the right thing to do for Ukraine. Even if that didn’t save them from future aggression, which I think was mostly the fault of the West for not being prepared to really sign a binding document and put the lives of their own soldiers on the line.

[hackandthink]

Mearsheimer was right in 1993 (nukes).

https://www.mearsheimer.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Mears...

He was right in 2014:

https://www.mearsheimer.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Why-t...

And he is still right:

https://mearsheimer.substack.com/p/who-caused-the-ukraine-wa...

[kakacik]

Not really, went through the last post and its an utter pile of shit to be very polite. Basically russian propaganda, seen 1000 times.

It ignores that people should have their right to self-determination, don't want to live under russian oppression. As somebody whose family lives were ruined by exactly same oppression of exactly same russia (err soviet union but we all know who set the absolute tone of that 'union' and once possible everybody else run the fuck away as quickly as possible) I can fully understand anybody who wants to have basic freedom and some prospect of future for their children - russia takes that away, they subjugate, oppress, erase whole ethnicities, whoever sticks out and their close ones is dealt with brutally.

Not worth the electrical energy used to display that text. Unless you enjoy russian propaganda, then all is good.

[lkramer]

I think this guy paints a difference in thought that is not really there. Putin sees Ukraine neutrality and impotence as vital to Russia's security. No, he probably does not want to actually annex Ukraine, that would be a ball ache he doesn't need, but he would like it to behave like Belarus.

I think the real difference lies in whether one believes Ukraine deserves to decide its own path, or if it's forever doomed to be a chess piece on the board between spheres of influence, which seems to be the mindset both Putin and Trump are stuck in.