Originally Posted by
NutLoose
I was not suggesting they use them, but the threat that they would may be enough to deter his ambitions, we gave them promises to get rid of their Nukes on the grounds that we would protect them...... How is that going by the way? There are mutterings in Ukraine that they should develop their own, and given they were one of the biggest nuclear powers once they will probably have the know how to do it.
They may have the know-how, but not the wherewithal. It is difficult to make weapons-grade uranium requiring very large numbers of expensive centrifuges produced by very few companies with export licensing restrictions.
As far as the protection promise went, I was surprised to read that that was only a memorandum and not a treaty and its value is actually limited. The only concrete and measurable terms are that Ukraine promises never to use or acquire nuclear weapons, and UK, US, Russia promise never to use force ( inc nuclear weapons ) on Ukraine. Those states also gave a commitment to support Ukraine if it was subject to aggresssion and you could certainly argue that the US and UK have done that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrain...weapon%20state.
Last edited by Tartiflette Fan; 19th Feb 2024 at 17:26.