President Obama has just
observed casually that Ukraine is not a member of NATO. It is a signatory to the
Budapest Memorandum, however, along with the United States:
The Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances is a political agreement signed in Budapest, Hungary on 5 December 1994, providing security assurances by its signatories relating to Ukraine's accession to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. The Memorandum was originally signed by three nuclear powers, the Russian Federation, the United States of America, and the United Kingdom. China and France gave somewhat weaker individual assurances in separate documents.
The memorandum included security assurances against threats or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of Ukraine as well as those of Belarus and Kazakhstan. As a result Ukraine gave up the world's third largest nuclear weapons stockpile between 1994 and 1996, of which Ukraine had physical though not operational control. The use of the weapons was dependent on Russian controlled electronic Permissive Action Links and the Russian command and control system.
Following the 2014 Crimean crisis, the U.S., Canada, the U.K., as well as the other countries all separately stated that Russian involvement is in breach of its obligations to Ukraine under the Budapest Memorandum, and in clear violation of Ukrainian sovereignty and territorial integrity. Russia, however, argued that the Budapest memorandum does not apply to the 2014 Crimean crisis because separation of Crimea was driven by an internal political and social-economic crisis. Russia initially claimed it was never under obligation to force any part of Ukraine's civilian population to stay in Ukraine against its will.
To answer Grim's question, should the people of Ukraine worry? If they were depending on their government's agreements with the U.S., the answer is yes. And why anyone would ever again give up nuclear weapons (or anything else) in exchange for assurances from us is a mystery to me.
4 comments:
That Putin's lie about Crimea was false on its face is obvious. The vote outcome in the separation "plebiscite" would have required at least 50% of the Tatar population fo vote for joining Russia. The same Tatars who were forcibly relocated to Siberia under the Soviets and who had only recently returned with Ukraine's independence.
But the US and the West were pleased to look the other way on that, too.
It's shameful.
Eric Hines
Putin's statement was not, as we say in hearsay disputes, offered to prove the truth of what it asserts. Like many of his statements--and he shares this practice with our President--it is tossed out for effect, such as threat or bluster, and the last thing he worries about is its correspondence with reality.
Relying on America is just as reliable as relying on the police to do everything for you.
Sounds like one of those "entangling alliances" some wise men once talked about.
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