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Are you insinuating the Soviets mishandled their nuclear weapons and didn’t take cataloging, securing, storing them seriously?
Or are you insinuating that you’re curious why NATO hasn’t given them a nuclear weapon to use on Russia with the explanation being that they found it after it slipped through the cracks of the denuclearization?
The first thought is uncharitable to the Soviet Union. Nuclear weapons are not disease tissue samples or spare medium arms, they’re fearsome weapons that are the most powerful in any arsenal.
As to the second, they can’t really pull that off because short of stealing one from Russia it would be obvious what happened and Russia might retaliate with nuclear weapons against those who gave it to the Ukrainians. It would be obvious because all fissile material in nuclear weapons is different, it carries signatures from where it was mined from, where it was put into breeder reactors, etc. And you can analyze this after detonation from the lingering particles. Anything from the west would be quickly zeroed and high chance Russia would nuke a NATO base in such a country in response.
As to the idea that the west would have left some with Ukraine during the disarming, I think at the time they were as shocked and high on the fumes of their success as communists were in pain. I don’t think they planned that far ahead and probably considered the risk of leaving some greater than just yoinking them. They probably wish otherwise now.
Come to think of it I’m not sure they would have been able to do anything easily. Wasn’t the process at least partially observed by international and somewhat impartial observers from the UN or something? I mean sure they could take them to the US or something and lie about dismantling them but at that point they’re not very useful either as everyone knows the US had chain of custody on such weapons so if they’re ever used in the future the US would get the blame obviously.
So we’re lucky in that respect because I’m sure the west would love some actually plausibly deniable way to use nuclear weapons on Russia or Russian forces.
Look into the 1994 trilateral statement. Ukraine was flush with nukes and wasn’t willing to give them up until the UK, US, and Russia came in to cut them big checks and give security guarantees. This wasn’t a smooth process and wasn’t handled by the soviets as they were not a government for 3 years at that point so whatever systems they had in place were breaking down. Ukraine was at least as corrupt and incompetent then as it is now so anything was possible regarding the mishandling of nukes at that point as far as I’m concerned.
Though at this point it’s clear Ukraine couldn’t or didn’t want to hide them for whatever reason so you’re right that western oversight was capable enough to handle the situation.
Are you insinuating the Soviets mishandled their nuclear weapons and didn’t take cataloging, securing, storing them seriously?
Or are you insinuating that you’re curious why NATO hasn’t given them a nuclear weapon to use on Russia with the explanation being that they found it after it slipped through the cracks of the denuclearization?
The first thought is uncharitable to the Soviet Union. Nuclear weapons are not disease tissue samples or spare medium arms, they’re fearsome weapons that are the most powerful in any arsenal.
As to the second, they can’t really pull that off because short of stealing one from Russia it would be obvious what happened and Russia might retaliate with nuclear weapons against those who gave it to the Ukrainians. It would be obvious because all fissile material in nuclear weapons is different, it carries signatures from where it was mined from, where it was put into breeder reactors, etc. And you can analyze this after detonation from the lingering particles. Anything from the west would be quickly zeroed and high chance Russia would nuke a NATO base in such a country in response.
As to the idea that the west would have left some with Ukraine during the disarming, I think at the time they were as shocked and high on the fumes of their success as communists were in pain. I don’t think they planned that far ahead and probably considered the risk of leaving some greater than just yoinking them. They probably wish otherwise now.
Come to think of it I’m not sure they would have been able to do anything easily. Wasn’t the process at least partially observed by international and somewhat impartial observers from the UN or something? I mean sure they could take them to the US or something and lie about dismantling them but at that point they’re not very useful either as everyone knows the US had chain of custody on such weapons so if they’re ever used in the future the US would get the blame obviously.
So we’re lucky in that respect because I’m sure the west would love some actually plausibly deniable way to use nuclear weapons on Russia or Russian forces.
Look into the 1994 trilateral statement. Ukraine was flush with nukes and wasn’t willing to give them up until the UK, US, and Russia came in to cut them big checks and give security guarantees. This wasn’t a smooth process and wasn’t handled by the soviets as they were not a government for 3 years at that point so whatever systems they had in place were breaking down. Ukraine was at least as corrupt and incompetent then as it is now so anything was possible regarding the mishandling of nukes at that point as far as I’m concerned.
Though at this point it’s clear Ukraine couldn’t or didn’t want to hide them for whatever reason so you’re right that western oversight was capable enough to handle the situation.