Formal name: Memorandum on Security Assurances
More commonly known as: the Budapest Memorandum

There are many reasons why I support Ukraine. As a Ukraine supporter, an American, and someone concerned about nuclear proliferation, I need to talk about the Budapest Memorandum.

When the USSR broke up, Ukraine inherited approximately 1900 Soviet nuclear warheads, the world’s 3^rd largest nuclear arsenal. At that time, nuclear proliferation was a grave concern, especially regarding the security of nuclear warheads and material in the former USSR. Securing this material was a top US foreign policy priority.

The Budapest Memorandum was signed in Budapest in December 5, 1994 by Ukraine, Russia, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Ukraine agreed to surrender its nuclear arsenal and accede to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons in exchange for promises that the other 3 countries would:

1. “respect the Independence and Sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine.”
2. “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-defense or otherwise in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations.”
3. “refrain from economic coercion designed to subordinate to their own interest the exercise by Ukraine of the rights inherent in its sovereignty and thus to secure advantages of any kind.”
4. “seek immediate United Nations Security Council action to provide assistance to Ukraine, as a non-nuclear-weapon State Party to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, if Ukraine should become a victim of an act of aggression or an object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used.”
5. “reaffirm, in the case of the Ukraine, their commitment not to use nuclear weapons against any non-nuclear-weapon State Party to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, except in the case of an attack on themselves, their territories or dependent territories, their armed forces, or their allies, by such a state in association or alliance with a nuclear weapon state.”
6. “consult in the event a situation arises which raises a question concerning these commitments.”

The full text can be downloaded here. The entire document is about a 10 minute read. I recited most of it above if you don’t count the fluff.

Russia has grossly violated this agreement, going back at least to the 2014 annexation of Crimea. Russia’s violation of Points 1 and 2 are self-explanatory. Russia’s blockade and theft of Ukrainian grain is an example of violating Point 3. Concerning Point 4, Putin has repeatedly threatened nuclear war since launching the full-scale invasion in 2022.

One shocking development has been Trump’s bid force to Ukraine to effectively cede half of their mineral resources to the US as compensation for US support of Ukraine’s war effort. The finalized deal that Zelensky was meant to sign (still not signed) on February 28, 2025, the day of the infamous blowup in the Oval Office between Trump and Zelensky (with a major assist from JD Vance), seemed to be far less onerous than Trump’s original proposal. I’m convinced the original proposal was a violation of Point 3 of the Budapest Memorandum. I suspect the finalized proposal was too, though the issues of ownership and control were murky to me on reading a leaked draft of the text. It’s plausible, though shameful, that the US would default on its obligations in the Budapest Memorandum. Though the provisions regarding encroachment on Ukraine’s sovereignty apply to the US, UK, and Russia as written, I would have assumed without a second thought that Russia would be the only country of those 3 with which that would ever come up. Trump has done things I thought I would never see from a US president.

Misconceptions

Myth: The Budapest Memorandum obligates the United States to defend Ukraine.

It’s commonplace for the pro-Ukraine crowd, including (otherwise) reputable figures, to claim that the Budapest Memorandum obligates the US to intervene militarily on behalf of Ukraine or provide military aid to Ukraine in the event of an attack on Ukraine. The closest provision to this is Point 4, which is not even close, and only when nuclear weapons are used. That leaves Point 6, which obligates the US to “consult” with Russia and the UK. That’s practically nothing. I like to think that military aid to Ukraine is an appropriate response to Russia’s failure to “consult” in good faith.

Myth: Ukraine’s nuclear weapons were a guarantee against Russian invasion, a windfall that Ukraine squandered for little return.

I would not say that is completely untrue, but Ukraine would have faced possibly insurmountable challenges, and at tremendous cost, if it tried to keep its nuclear weapons. Consider:

• Nuclear warheads do not have an indefinite shelf life. Keeping them in service would have been enormously expensive. Aside from standing up the infrastructure to keep those weapons in service, Ukraine would have to maintain delivery systems that could penetrate Russian defenses to reach their targets. This likely would have been prohibitively expensive.
• The launch codes for the warheads were controlled by Moscow. Nuclear warheads have safeguards designed to thwart unauthorized actors attempting to detonate them. I will not speculate on how feasible it would be for Ukraine to engineer workarounds, but they were not launch-ready without Moscow’s cooperation.
• The west would not have embraced economic and financial integration between Ukraine and the west without Ukraine renouncing nuclear weapons.

Further reading

See Steven Pifer’s article Budapest Memorandum Myths.

In short, a Ukrainian nuclear arsenal inheritance would have been no panacea.

Should Ukraine have agreed to the Budapest Memorandum?

In hindsight, I don’t know. At the time I would have said yes without hesitating. I also would never have anticipated that America would adopt a Trumpist worldview.

At the time, Ukraine needed the west more than it needed nuclear weapons that were of questionable utility, and it was an easy call. I could see other countries taking the lesson that giving up their nuclear weapon programs for short term gain is not worth forfeiting their long-term self-sufficient national security. North Korea went all out on becoming a nuclear-armed state at great opportunity cost and remains shunned by most of the world. Ukraine took the high road. North Korea took the low road. Now, North Korea is looking at lot more secure than Ukraine.

There is bitterness in Ukraine over the Budapest Memorandum, especially since they’re in an existential war against an aggressor it was meant to restrain. If I’m a non-proliferation advocate, countries that voluntarily gave up their nuclear weapons and got buyer’s remorse is not a good look.

Consequences of writing off Ukraine

I don’t see how efforts to persuade other countries to remain non-nuclear could outweigh the cautionary tale of a defeated Ukraine.
Countries considering acquiring nuclear weapons are watching what we do about Ukraine. The United States, and really all countries, have a strong interest in preventing nuclear proliferation. At least, that has been the conventional wisdom.

I want to believe that, even with the US well on its way to dissolving its alliances, a new era of nuclear proliferation is not upon us. I would not blame countries like Germany, South Korea, and Japan for going nuclear. It might be the only responsible option they’re left with, given how irresponsible the US has become in abdicating its role as the leader of the free world. The UK and France have nuclear weapons, but it’s really the US that has provided the nuclear umbrella that has persuaded the rest of the free world (not counting India and probably Israel) not to go nuclear.

It would be a mistake to construe the Budapest Memorandum to set the upper limit of what the US should do to help Ukraine. At the very least, the US must never infringe on Ukraine’s sovereignty, such as by laying claim to Ukraine’s national resources.