With Russia starting a full-scale military invasion of Ukraine right after the conclusion of the 2022 Beijing Olympics and Ukraine declaring a state of emergency, it is essential to understand the history of Ukraine to understand why this is all happening, and why it could be the trigger for a third World War.
Ukraine declared its independence from the Soviet Union on December 1st, 1991. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in the same month, Moscow decided to leave about a third of their nuclear arsenal in Ukraine. Among those nuclear weapons, 3,000 were prepared to hit crucial military targets, and 2,000 were armed to destroy whole cities, which gave Ukraine the third largest nuclear arsenal in the world. However, Ukraine did not have control of these weapons, and the authority of firing these weapons still lay in Moscow’s hands.
On December 5th, 1994, after lengthy negotiations with Russia, the UK, and the US, the Ukraine signed an agreement with these countries named the ‘Budapest Memorandum’. The agreement involved Ukraine completely dismantling its nuclear arsenal in favor of preventing threats to its independence by these three countries. It also assured that the three countries will “refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of Ukraine, and that none of their weapons will ever be used against Ukraine except in self-defence or otherwise in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations”. After the Budapest Memorandum, the Ukraine declared itself a non-nuclear weapon state and acceded to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), which provides it protection from nuclear threats unless it threatens a nuclear country or its allies. All four countries who signed the Budapest Memorandum agreed that negotiations would occur if a situation arose which conflicted with the agreement.
Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, declared the Memorandum invalid as it was signed with the previous Ukrainian government, and used that argument to seize Crimea from Ukraine in 2014. Putin recently claimed that Ukraine did not give away all their Soviet nuclear technology, and was planning to make its own nuclear weapons, which would contradict Ukraine’s status as a non-nuclear weapon state, and thus used that argument to start an invasion. By the Budapest Memorandum, the US and the UK should interfere with the situation. However, the US’ public admonishment of Russia is not slowing Russian advances, and if the two powers were to start a military clash, it could blow out into a full-scale World War with unprecedented devastation considering the two countries’ nuclear arsenals.
With China’s recent friendly interactions with Russia, and the US’ growing frustration with the two countries, the world is holding its breath in critical anticipation. Nobody can accurately predict the outcome of this conflict, but it is certain to be one for the history books.