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Ukraine had them, but Russia had exclusive control over those missiles [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapons_and_Ukraine https://en.wikipedia.

by tromp 5y ago

Ukraine had them, but Russia had exclusive control over those missiles [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapons_and_Ukraine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapons_and_Ukraine

kspacewalk2 5y ago
"Control" is a relative term. Ukraine had physical control, gaining full access is a problem akin to finding a way to open a safe you're lawfully in long-term possession of. Ukraine also has nuclear power stations galore and factories that allow it to make modern ballistic missiles.
- mardifoufs 5y ago
  No, ukraine did not have the codes or any way to detonate the bombs otherwise. They were not functional and nukes are made to be extremely hard to detonate without the proper procedures. But most importantly, nuclear weapons and their delivery vehicules are enormously expensive to maintain. Ukraine is already a very poor country now, but there was absolutely no way it could have afforded to maintain a nuclear arsenal in the 1990s. And that's even if they didn't have to reverse engineer an arsenal that it did not even control. I'll try to find a pretty good thread, written by a nuclear expert who was part of the 1994s negotiations, that went into greater details and explained why ukraine never had the capacity to keep the nukes or even do anything useful with them.
  - kspacewalk2 5y ago
    >No, ukraine did not have the codes or any way to detonate the bombs otherwise. They were not functional and nukes are made to be extremely hard to detonate without the proper procedures. But not so hard that a nation of 40 million with many thousands of engineers who took part in designing every aspect of that bomb cannot figure it out if they want to. This would simply not be a serious issue. >But most importantly, nuclear weapons and their delivery vehicules are enormously expensive to maintain. Ukraine is already a very poor country now, but there was absolutely no way it could have afforded to maintain a nuclear arsenal in the 1990s. Hundreds of bombs, no. A dozen - easily. Yes, poor, but the sheer size of it would allow it to maintain a small nuclear arsenal. >And that's even if they didn't have to reverse engineer an arsenal that it did not even control. It did control it, because it was on Ukrainian soil, and you greatly overestimate the ability of a large country to reverse engineer or replace some detonators.
valdiorn 5y ago
This is such a ridiculous fact everyone likes to bring up. If provided with an arsenal of working nukes sans launch control, it would take Ukrainian engineers and physicists maybe 2 weeks to bypass the existing controls and fabricate new ones. It's not like nukes have tamper proof switches.
- kspacewalk2 5y ago
  2 weeks might be optimistic, but I agree that this is a non-issue.

by tromp 5y ago

Ukraine had them, but Russia had exclusive control over those missiles [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapons_and_Ukraine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapons_and_Ukraine

kspacewalk2 5y ago

"Control" is a relative term. Ukraine had physical control, gaining full access is a problem akin to finding a way to open a safe you're lawfully in long-term possession of. Ukraine also has nuclear power stations galore and factories that allow it to make modern ballistic missiles.

mardifoufs 5y ago
No, ukraine did not have the codes or any way to detonate the bombs otherwise. They were not functional and nukes are made to be extremely hard to detonate without the proper procedures. But most importantly, nuclear weapons and their delivery vehicules are enormously expensive to maintain. Ukraine is already a very poor country now, but there was absolutely no way it could have afforded to maintain a nuclear arsenal in the 1990s. And that's even if they didn't have to reverse engineer an arsenal that it did not even control. I'll try to find a pretty good thread, written by a nuclear expert who was part of the 1994s negotiations, that went into greater details and explained why ukraine never had the capacity to keep the nukes or even do anything useful with them.
- kspacewalk2 5y ago
  >No, ukraine did not have the codes or any way to detonate the bombs otherwise. They were not functional and nukes are made to be extremely hard to detonate without the proper procedures. But not so hard that a nation of 40 million with many thousands of engineers who took part in designing every aspect of that bomb cannot figure it out if they want to. This would simply not be a serious issue. >But most importantly, nuclear weapons and their delivery vehicules are enormously expensive to maintain. Ukraine is already a very poor country now, but there was absolutely no way it could have afforded to maintain a nuclear arsenal in the 1990s. Hundreds of bombs, no. A dozen - easily. Yes, poor, but the sheer size of it would allow it to maintain a small nuclear arsenal. >And that's even if they didn't have to reverse engineer an arsenal that it did not even control. It did control it, because it was on Ukrainian soil, and you greatly overestimate the ability of a large country to reverse engineer or replace some detonators.

valdiorn 5y ago

This is such a ridiculous fact everyone likes to bring up. If provided with an arsenal of working nukes sans launch control, it would take Ukrainian engineers and physicists maybe 2 weeks to bypass the existing controls and fabricate new ones. It's not like nukes have tamper proof switches.

kspacewalk2 5y ago
2 weeks might be optimistic, but I agree that this is a non-issue.