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? They had nuclear weapons, but gave them up in a treaty with Russia in exchange for security guarantees. Russia betrayed Ukraine by violating that treaty by th

? They had nuclear weapons, but gave them up in a treaty with Russia in exchange for security guarantees. Russia betrayed Ukraine by violating that treaty by the Crimea invasion in 2014. See the Budapest Memorandum [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_Memorandum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_Memorandum

tuukkah 2y ago
US and UK are parties in the same treaty as guarantors that provided "security assurances". US pressured Ukraine into signing the treaty so they are partly to blame for it.
Synaesthesia 2y ago
They never had the launch codes, which were controlled by the Soviet Union, whose successor was Russia.
- thrw42A8N 2y ago
  You think the Ukrainian commanders serving for the Soviet union didn't have the codes?
- jjallen 2y ago
  Pretty sure you could figure out how to launch a nuke if you possessed them and were a decently sized nation state with decent universities...
  - ashoeafoot 2y ago
    and had the people who built them in the first place
  - rwmj 2y ago
    Interesting question, and actually the answer could be no (surprisingly). Some US nukes use varying compositions of high explosives in the primary stage. You have to set them off in a particular order, and that's the launch code (or part of it presumably). Even possessing the nukes, it would be hard to work out that sequence, since testing the explosives is destructive. And if you fire them in the wrong order, the primary fizzles and the bomb doesn't work. (I've no idea if the Russian weapons used such a system)
    - tuukkah 2y ago
      If you know what you are doing and have time, you can rebuild the bombs.
      - account42 2y ago
        Exactly. The hard part is getting the enriched fuel. And that's only because bigger nations than you will make sure that you don't get that. Baisc nuclear weapons aren't rocket science anymore.
neonsunset 2y ago
What an interesting way to misquote this. The signatories of the memorandum were: Belarus, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, russia, United States and United Kingdom. Arguably, the ongoing policy of the US administration w.r.t. of strike prohibitions is in violation of the memorandum terms. Obviously, russia egregiously violated the memorandum as well as a multitude of (now effectively non-functional) international laws and has committed a large amount of crimes against humanity it was not and still isn't held accountable for.

tuukkah 2y ago

US and UK are parties in the same treaty as guarantors that provided "security assurances". US pressured Ukraine into signing the treaty so they are partly to blame for it.

Synaesthesia 2y ago

They never had the launch codes, which were controlled by the Soviet Union, whose successor was Russia.

thrw42A8N 2y ago
You think the Ukrainian commanders serving for the Soviet union didn't have the codes?
jjallen 2y ago
Pretty sure you could figure out how to launch a nuke if you possessed them and were a decently sized nation state with decent universities...
- ashoeafoot 2y ago
  and had the people who built them in the first place
- rwmj 2y ago
  Interesting question, and actually the answer could be no (surprisingly). Some US nukes use varying compositions of high explosives in the primary stage. You have to set them off in a particular order, and that's the launch code (or part of it presumably). Even possessing the nukes, it would be hard to work out that sequence, since testing the explosives is destructive. And if you fire them in the wrong order, the primary fizzles and the bomb doesn't work. (I've no idea if the Russian weapons used such a system)
  - tuukkah 2y ago
    If you know what you are doing and have time, you can rebuild the bombs.
    - account42 2y ago
      Exactly. The hard part is getting the enriched fuel. And that's only because bigger nations than you will make sure that you don't get that. Baisc nuclear weapons aren't rocket science anymore.

neonsunset 2y ago

What an interesting way to misquote this. The signatories of the memorandum were: Belarus, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, russia, United States and United Kingdom. Arguably, the ongoing policy of the US administration w.r.t. of strike prohibitions is in violation of the memorandum terms. Obviously, russia egregiously violated the memorandum as well as a multitude of (now effectively non-functional) international laws and has committed a large amount of crimes against humanity it was not and still isn't held accountable for.