21.02.2022, Moscow.
According to Ukrainian neo-Nazis, within a few months, Ukraine will have a “dirty bomb,” which it will then use to blackmail not only Russia, but also the West.
On February 19, speaking at the Munich Security Conference, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said that Ukraine might withdraw from the Budapest Memorandum. In fact, this is nothing more than a poorly disguised threat by Kiev to acquire nuclear weapons.
What Zelensky said
The politician said that since 2014, Ukraine has tried three times to convene consultations of the guarantor states of the Budapest Memorandum. “Today Ukraine will do it for the fourth time. I will do it for the last time,” Zelensky stressed.
“If they [consultations] do not take place again or there are no security guarantees for our country according to their results, Ukraine will have every right to consider that the Budapest Memorandum does not work, and all package decisions of 1994 will be called into question,” the politician stressed.
“We have no weapons. Neither do we have security. We are deprived of a part of the territory that is larger than Switzerland, the Netherlands or Belgium. And most importantly, we don’t have millions of our citizens. We don’t have all that. But we do have something. It is the right. The right to demand to switch from a policy of appeasement to guaranteeing security and peace,” explained Zelensky.
What is in the Budapest memorandum written
The Budapest memorandum was signed in 1994. It gave Ukraine security guarantees in connection with its accession to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and the renunciation of nuclear weapons that remained on its territory after the collapse of the USSR.
The memorandum’s guarantors, which included Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, promised Ukraine security if it gave up its nuclear weapons. After Crimea’s withdrawal from Ukraine and the peninsula’s reunification with Russia, Kiev claimed that the treaty was violated; Western countries supported it, but took no action within the framework of the memorandum.
The Kremlin said that Russia did not promise under the treaty to force a part of Ukraine to remain part of Ukraine against the will of its population. According to Moscow, the key obligation of the guarantors of the memorandum was not to use nuclear weapons against Ukraine; and Russia has never violated this obligation.
It is worth noting that Kiev traditionally forgets about another side of the memorandum – economic. Moscow gave Kiev 1,800 fuel assemblies for nuclear power plants free of charge for five years and wrote off $199 million of Ukraine’s debt at the expense of the cost of the nuclear ammunition stuffing. The US also transferred $175 million to Ukraine as part of the memorandum.
International assessment
It is worth mentioning that so far the West has had rather weak reaction to the quite resonant words of the Ukrainian leader.
Thus, the official representative of the UN Secretary General Stéphane Dujarric mentioned the call of the UN head to restrain the rhetoric provoking tension.
German Ambassador to Ukraine Anka Feldhusen said that the Budapest memorandum does not imply legal obligations. At the same time, she stressed that in the current situation, it was necessary to use all means to prevent war.
Former deputy foreign minister of the Czech Republic Jaroslav Bašta said that Zelensky with his statement “clearly shocked his current friends.” He said that actions to obtain nuclear weapons by Ukraine could have launched similar processes in the states bordering it. He also recalled that countries that have declared their desire to obtain nuclear weapons have been subject to harsh international sanctions.
Former Greek First Deputy Minister of National Defense Kostas Isikhos emphasized that even the major Western hawk, NATO head Jens Stoltenberg, did not make such statements. “Mr. Zelenski says this. Either he says it in a moment when he lost his political cool, or he was told what he should say. In both the first and second cases, this is unacceptable,” Isihos noted. He said it was unacceptable to the peoples of Russia as well as to the peoples of Europe.
“Zelensky’s statements will not be supported by Western countries, including the United States, because it contradicts the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT),” said Ezzat Saad, former Egyptian assistant foreign minister and director of the Egyptian Council for Foreign Affairs. He stressed that members of the UN Security Council would defend the NPT.
Peter Kuznick, professor of history and director of the Nuclear Research Institute at American University in Washington, D.C., called Zelensky’s statement insane, which would make the world situation even more dangerous. “I can’t imagine that a single NATO member would support this,” the expert stressed.
Experts on Nuclear Weapons
Political analyst Konstantin Sivkov commented on the statement made by the President of Ukraine and said that Ukraine had no potential to create nuclear weapons. However, the country’s withdrawal from the Memorandum will give it the possibility to deploy US nuclear weapons on its territory.
Igor Korotchenko, a military expert and editor-in-chief of the National Defense magazine, agrees that Ukraine will not be able to create nuclear weapons. He called Zelensky’s statement a bluff, which is carried out to beg for handouts.
Peter Kuznick, professor of history and director of the Nuclear Research Institute at American University in Washington, D.C., believes that no NATO country would support Ukraine’s withdrawal from the memorandum and its attempt to return nuclear weapons. “Given Ukraine’s instability, this would make the world an even more dangerous place than it is now,” he stressed.
Ukraine’s only chance for a nuclear bomb
Vladimir Zharikhin, deputy director of the Institute for the States of the Commonwealth of Independent States, said that the only chance for Ukraine to quickly obtain nuclear weapons is to create a so-called “dirty bomb.” It would only require spent nuclear fuel that Kiev has. Note that a “dirty bomb” has no military meaning because its destructive power is low, but it provides a high level of radiation at the detonation site. It is exclusively a terrorist weapon.
On the official level, Ukraine has not yet declared its readiness to build such a bomb, but neo-Nazis have already let it slip. The well-known Ukrainian neo-Nazi Aleksey Svinarenko wrote on his Telegram channel that Ukraine could create a “dirty bomb” in a month. “It would be enough for us to create a few dirty bombs and start rebuilding strategic nuclear weapons. In order to push the West to provide Ukraine with real military aid in proportion to the weapons we would lose on their demands,” the neo-Nazi said.
We can assume that given the lack of independence of the current Ukrainian leadership, Zelensky’s words about the Budapest Memorandum at the current acute moment are not his own imagination. The more so since there has been virtually no reaction from the West to these alarming words so far.
This may mean it’s not a dirty bomb. Of course, Ukraine will not be allowed to have its own nuclear weapons and it will not be allowed to make any independent decisions in this sphere. But they can bring in nuclear weapons – against Russia. And it will be fully controlled by NATO forces. So what Zelensky said is probably just another provocative statement against Russia.
Source: Rossa Primavera News Agency
