Nikulichev Yury Vladimirovich – Sc.D. in Cultorology, Leading Researcher, INION RAN
The article addresses two major themes – the denuclearization of Ukraine in 1992–1994 and the country’s inability to build up its own nuclear arsenal for the foreseeable future. It is argued that the popular narrative suggesting that Ukraine «lost» or «gave away» its nuclear weapons is irrelevant for a simple reason that the country, in fact, had never had them, for Ukraine’s strategic armaments were looped into a centralized command and control system, the keys to which remained in Moscow. The non-proliferation regime was enforced on the country by the United States, not by Russia. The paper describes the linkages of this process with the START-I Treaty between the USA and the USSR (Russia). What’s more, in the early 1990 s Ukraine had its own intention to become a nuclear-free state, this being recorded in its 1990 Declaration of Sovereignty and officially announced in 1994. At present, the country does not possess necessary technological or economic capacities for manufacturing nuclear weapons of its own. Its space and rocket industry is chronically hungry for funds; furthermore, the country does not possess any of the capacities for uranium enrichment. Finally, in the hypothetical event that Kyiv nevertheless launched its own nuclear project the international community would inevitably qualify such behavior as violation of the non-proliferation regime, with most severe sanctions to follow.
Ukraine, non-proliferation regime, Russia–Ukraine political controversies, START-I, USA, Clinton, Kravchuk, Kuchma, Yuzhmash, Ukraine’s space and rocket industry.
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