patrick.net

Al_Sharpton_for_President says

And then Ukraine's shelling of the breakaway regions will then be shelling Russia.

What will Russia do then? Call up more cannon fodder? Fire moar North Korean artillery rounds? Empty more prisons?

Are they really going to use tactical nukes on the border of their newly stolen land and enjoy hanging onto territory immediately downstream of a radioactive wasteland with all the rivers running through it?

Russia has already blown their wad and are embarrassing themselves more by the day.

Ceffer says

I don't see a bathroom, kitchen, bedroom, or toilet but there's parking for 9 cars.

Yeah, that looks like government level incompetence.

Hopium for our Russkie haters and Nazi denialistas.
https://t.me/gatewaypunditofficial/18335

Time to put the whole "NUKES!!!! NUKES!!!" bullshit to rest: we've just witnessed a newly-annexed and declared "Russian forever" Kherson taken back by Ukies and all Pukin could squeeze out of himself was "it's an orderly retreat to prepared positions". Shittested (again) and failed (again).

Chicken Littles should sleep well tonight - the sky is not falling on their tiny sculls hosting even tinier brains.

Shaman says

I think someone is bucking for the toaster…

Needs an update for "I'm leaving Twitter! Evil Billionaires (but not Soros or Gates)!"

Stick a fork in it, folks:

Vladimir Putin has said the threat of a nuclear war was rising, but insisted Russia had not "gone mad" and would not use its nuclear weapons first.

....he asserted that Russia would "under no circumstances" use the weapons first, and would not threaten anyone with its nuclear arsenal.

"We have not gone mad, we are aware of what nuclear weapons are," he said, adding: "We aren't about to run around the world brandishing this weapon like a razor."

cisTits says

He was referring to strategic nuclear weapons, not tactical.

He won't do it either way. He'd be dead in 24-48 hours if he launched a nuke of any kind. Not sure why this is even a conversation. What good does it do to be melted and shit on with radioactive shit? That's the outcome. I don't think that's called winning.

If a nuke goes off, everyone outside of Western nations will assume it was a Western nation that detonated it.

Will Pukin nuke Rostov now? How about Voronezh? Both?

RWSGFY says

Will Pukin nuke Rostov now? How about Voronezh? Both?

Both have been bombed already. But since this can not happen, must be CIA propaganda

Sooo, what would be the red line crossing of which triggers "zee nukez"?

Bombing of the Kerch bridge? - crossed 3x

Bombing of various installations on Crimea territory? - crossed 100x

Kicking Red war criminals out of newly-annexed territories? - crossed

Incursions into the USSR proper across 1991 border? - crossed

Bombing of various strategic targets, including elements of the nuclear triade, deep inside USSR's 1991 borders? - crossed

Bombing of Kremlin dome? - crossed

Tricemation and beheading of the Red Fleet and turning it into a flotila? - crossed

How many more shittests will Pukin fail?

RWSGFY says

How many more shittests will Pukin fail?

How far are you willing to push Russia?

One stated goal of our Ukraine war with Russia is to weaken their military. Another stated goal is to break up the Russian nation.

Do you really think it is worth the risk of thermonuclear war to prop up the illegitimate Zelensky regime?

Onvacation says

One stated goal of our Ukraine war with Russia is to weaken their military. Another stated goal is to break up the Russian nation.

There is no formal US policy to break up Russia. You sound like the bonkers paranoid Russian apparatchiks on RT.

Once Russia stops illegally invading their sovereign neighbor the killing and threat of nuclear war goes away overnight.

socal2 says

There is no formal US policy to break up Russia.

But it's clearly what the US is attempting to do.

https://mronline.org/2022/06/27/u-s-govt-body-plots-to-break-up-russia-in-name-of-decolonization/

socal2 says

Once Russia stops illegally invading their sovereign neighbor the killing and threat of nuclear war goes away overnight.

What's wrong with illegal invasions of sovereign nations? The US does it ALL THE TIME.

socal2 says

There is no formal US policy to break up Russia. You sound like the bonkers paranoid Russian apparatchiks on RT.

Do you even know how to use Google?

A U.S. government body held a Congressional briefing plotting ways to break up Russia as a country, in the name of supposed “decolonization.”

Titled “Decolonizing Russia: A Moral and Strategic Imperative,” the June 23 briefing was organized by the U.S. Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), known more commonly as the Helsinki Commission.

This commission claims to be “independent,” but it is a U.S. government agency created and overseen by Congress.

This “Decolonizing Russia” briefing is one of a growing number of examples of the U.S. government co-opting left-wing rhetoric in order to advance its imperial interests.

https://mronline.org/2022/06/27/u-s-govt-body-plots-to-break-up-russia-in-name-of-decolonization/

iwog2 says

Ukey Bullshit Counter-offensive Paid By You And Me.

We were promised that they would be at the Sea of Azov MONTHS ago.

socal2 says

There is no formal US policy to break up Russia.

Then why do they want to weaken Russia's military?

Is there an informal policy to break up Russia?

If so, the fight is here in the US. The fight is HERE in the US.

Fucking warmongers.

Aaaand they now calling for popping nukes inside their own Lebensraum:

Russian propagandist Margarita Simonyan called for detonating a nuclear bomb over Siberia.

She said that if a thermonuclear explosion is carried out over Siberia, then supposedly “there will be no nuclear winter, and no one will die from cancer, but all radio electronics and all satellites will be disabled.”

According to the editor-in-chief of the propaganda publication RT, then “we will return to something like ’93 – with wired telephones.”

“We lived wonderfully, and she will even be happy, because then I won’t have to explain to the children why everyone has gadgets and they don’t,” she said.

According to her, this option remains, and it is “the most humane, the most herbivorous.”

The broad:

Onvacation says

Then why do they want to weaken Russia's military?

To stop it from attacking its neighbor thus fulfilling our (ant their, btw) obligations under Budapest Memorandum of 1994 which was signed by the US, the UK and the USSR in exchange for Ukraine giving up 2400 literal THERMONUCLEAR WARHEADS and delivery vehicles for them. Don't pretent you didn't know about that little detail - that's Cucker Tarlson shtick and you wouldn't want to take food out of his kids mouths, would you?

Eric Holder says

To stop it from attacking its neighbor thus fulfilling our (ant their, btw) obligations under Budapest Memorandum of 1994, duh.

A lot of it is about the Kremlin protecting its the Russian identity. Its about trying to get back as close as possible when Russia had a lot of influence over the Baltic states, and eastern Europe. Some of it is nationalistic and ethnic identity and the rest is financial interests.

Go back to when Yanukovych backed out of joining the EU and accepted Russia's trade deal and loan guarantees. That was set off his ousting as President of Ukraine.

.

Well, on the bright side, after nuclear armageddon, Ukraine's puffed wheat harvest will be spectacular.

Another shittest failed:



These still holding their breaths for "nukes" should probably stop by now.

What happened? I thought loose talk about "nukes this and nukes that" was fun... Why the long face now?

Russian state run media is reporting Friday that the Kremlin is closely monitoring a high-explosive experiment that the U.S. carried out this week at a nuclear test site in Nevada.

Wednesday's test used chemicals and radioisotopes to "validate new predictive explosion models" that can help detect atomic blasts in other countries, Bloomberg reported, citing the Department of Energy.

The Interfax News Agency said Friday that Russian presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov told reporters at a briefing that Russia is now closely monitoring the situation.

"Earlier, the Federation Council [of the Federal Assembly of Russia] stated that the underground tests on October 18 in Nevada should be given an international legal assessment, since the United States is a signatory to the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) and is obliged to refrain from violating this agreement," Interfax also reported.

Corey Hinderstein, deputy administrator for Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation at the National Nuclear Security Administration, said in a statement, "These experiments advance our efforts to develop new technology in support of U.S. nuclear nonproliferation goals."

"They will help reduce global nuclear threats by improving the detection of underground nuclear explosive tests," he added.

The U.S. test is notable because of its timing. Russian lawmakers have announced their intention to revoke their ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

A bill will go to the Russian upper house, the Federation Council, which will consider it next week. Federation Council lawmakers have already said they will support the bill.

The treaty, adopted in 1996, bans all nuclear explosions anywhere in the world, although it has never fully entered into force. In addition to the U.S., it is yet to be ratified by China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, Israel, Iran and Egypt.

-- Fox

Well, well, well, lookie here:



https://www.studocu.com/es-ar/document/universidad-nacional-de-la-plata/historia-general-vi/john-mearsheimer-the-case-for-a-ukrainian-nuclear-deterrent/57917529

Turns out, back in 1993 Mearsheimer still had some brains in his head. Or hasn't taken money from a certain organization yet...

Eric Holder says

Don't pretent you didn't know about that little detail - that's Cucker Tarlson shtick and you wouldn't want to take food out of his kids mouths, would you?

Hunter is not hungry.

Why do you suppose US politician's children get paid huge sums of money from Ukraine? What did Hunter actually do for Burisma? Why don't we investigate?

Not expecting cogent answers.

Onvacation says

Eric Holder says

Don't pretent you didn't know about that little detail - that's Cucker Tarlson shtick and you wouldn't want to take food out of his kids mouths, would you?

Hunter is not hungry.

Why do you suppose US politician's children get paid huge sums of money from Ukraine? What did Hunter actually do for Burisma? Why don't we investigate?

Not expecting cogent answers.

From USSR, "akshually". Zlochevsky - Burisma owner- was a member of Yanukovich cabinet and fled after his patron fled. He was a head of what is their equivalent of DoE and was funneling lucrative government energy leases to his own company (Corruption? You wouldn't say!) Just like his boss he had long ties with the KGB and was part of the plot to absorb Ukraine back into the USSR. After fleeing Ukraine he hired Hunter as a poison pill to protect his assets from being investigated by the new powers and it worked to the point he felt safe to return (briefly). He's back under criminal investigation since 2019 (after Hunted left Burisma, lol) and fled again.

So here you are - cogent answers which were given many times and ignored.

And you didn't seriosly ask why Bidet doesn't investigate himself, did you?

TL;DR: Hunter took money from a KGB-affiliated enemy of Ukraine to
protect him from anti-corruption investigation. It resumed after Hunter left.

Why One Does Not Negotiate with Nuclear Terrorists, ex-‪IISSorg‬ William Alberque:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=J98iP7ninaI&feature=youtu.be

Soo, a week into Ukrainian Special Military Operation on Soviet soil proper, 480 sq.km. lost to advancing "Nazis" (not my number but Soviet MoD's admission), at least 80 thousand civilians displaced, 28 towns and villages lost (again, Soviet MoD number) and it's treated by the Soviets like basically nothingburger, "a provocation" (Pukin's words, not mine). And not even a peep about anything nukelar anymore. 🤡

All that nuclear posturing was aimed at gullible scaredy Western chicken littles and everybody who knows the Soviets fucking told them so, but nobody listened to them. The war could've been over for almost two years now if fucking Potato and his Obongo admin leftovers gave all necessary arms to the Ukies back in the fall of 2022 instead of making them halt Kharkiv offensive half-way, forcing them to let 40,000 of best Red Army troops escape Kherson cauldron and drip-feeding weapons and ammo at snail pace waiting for "reasonable Pukin" to come to his senses (and giving the Soviets time to regroup, mobilize new cannon fodder, fortify lines of defense and adapt to new weapons like HIMARS).

Fucking weak-ass pussies.

I automatically dislike comments that misuse the word 'Soviet'.

The threat of using tactical nukes in Ukraine is now offcially hollow and has been for some time, because Ukies now have the capability of striking deep inside Soviet territory, as demonstrated by recent series of successfull attacks on strategic ammo depots, bomber bases and such using domestically designed and developed jet drones. (Pay attention to the "domestically designed and developed" part - this means they don't need to ask Potato's permission to use them). They reached as far as Murmansk strategic bombers base. This is about 1200-1300 miles from Ukraine as crow flies in case you forgot where Murmanks was. And they are capable of destroying hardened facilities like these "nuke-proof" ammo depots which caused small earthquakes when they were blown up. Which means ALL nuclear power stations this side of Ural mountains are within range, vulnerable and the Red Army does not have enough air defence capabilities to cover them all.

And boy oh boy the target environment is RICH:



Obninsk is 60 miles from Moscow, Kalinin - 180, Smolenks - 200.... you get the picture.

So put it to rest, boys and girls: tactical nukes are not habbening.

Eric Holder says

And boy oh boy the target environment is RICH:

Yeah. To increase the likelyhood of use of the nukes. You obviously have never heard of 'use it or lose it'.

DemocratsAreTotallyFucked says

Eric Holder says

And boy oh boy the target environment is RICH:

Yeah. To increase the likelyhood of use of the nukes. You obviously have never heard of 'use it or lose it'.

You sound like these libbies who bray about "having a gun in home is more dangerous than not having it". Being able to strike NPP close to Moscow is a deterrent against first use of tactical nukes by the opponent.

What does "use it or lose it" mean in this particular context? I have a rifle in my safe. I haven't used it in anger. Will I lose it because of that? I don't think so.

Last month, with little fanfare, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made the stakes of the ongoing war in Ukraine as clear as possible. With Russian troops bearing down on Ukraine’s east, and with Western support continuing to flag, Zelensky clarified the potential outcomes of the war. “Either Ukraine will have nuclear weapons and that will be our protection or we should have some sort of alliance,” he said. “Apart from NATO, today we do not know any effective alliances.”

It was the first time the Ukrainian president had revealed an outcome that has become, for the war’s observers, increasingly inescapable. In this war for Ukraine’s survival, with Kyiv facing both declining men and materiel, the only surefire way of preventing Ukraine’s ongoing destruction is NATO membership—a reality that has gained more supporters since the war’s beginning but still remains years away. Barring such an outcome, as Zelensky outlined, only one option remains: developing Ukraine’s own nuclear arsenal and returning it to the role of a nuclear power that it gave up some three decades ago.

For Western interlocutors, Zelensky’s revelation may have come as a shock. But for anyone paying attention to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s accelerating designs, the revelation that Kyiv may pursue its own nuclear arsenal is anything but. Putin, after all, has only grown increasingly messianic and monomaniacal in his efforts to shatter Ukraine. Previous designs on simply toppling Kyiv have given way to outright efforts to “destroy Ukrainian statehood,” especially following Ukraine’s successful occupation in Russia’s Kursk region, as the Moscow Times recently reported. With Ukrainian statehood—and even Ukrainian identity, given Russia’s genocidal efforts—at stake, any nation would understandably pursue any option available for survival.

Perhaps more importantly, Zelensky is resurfacing an important part of Ukrainian history that many in the West seem to have forgotten but that the West bears significant responsibility for. In the aftermath of the Soviet collapse, Ukraine emerged as one of a handful of nations to claim a segment of the Soviet nuclear arsenal. And almost immediately, the United States and Russia led a joint effort to strip Ukraine of its new weapons, succeeding in 1994 via the now infamous Budapest Memorandum. It was a move that, at the time, resulted in rounds of condescending self-congratulation around Washington—and that, in time, set the stage for Russia’s later invasion of Ukraine. Now, as Zelensky has made clear, that bill is coming due—and the West now faces the option of finally welcoming Ukraine into NATO’s ranks or risking it becoming a nuclear power once more.

WHEN THE SOVIET UNION IMPLODED in 1991—undone, in large part, via anti-colonial, pro-independence efforts from Ukrainians—the Soviet nuclear arsenal was split among a number of new nations, including Ukraine. And almost immediately, U.S. officials decided that Kyiv could not, and should not, be trusted to maintain its own nuclear arsenal.

This reality has been made blindingly clear by recent archival work from a number of scholars, poring through overlooked U.S. and Ukrainian documents. For instance, Columbia University’s George Bogden has recently published extensively on the internal debates in both the United States and Ukraine surrounding Kyiv’s post-Soviet arsenal. In so doing, the documents have revealed not only the arrogance of U.S. officials, who prioritized relations with Moscow over all else, but also the clear consternation, and clear warnings, of officials in Ukraine who realized what they were giving up.

In both the George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton administrations, U.S. officials placed continued emphasis on reassuring Russia that Moscow could have regional primacy—and that the United States was not trying to take advantage of the power vacuum emerging in the Soviet rubble. And part of that was giving in to Moscow’s demands that all of the Soviet nuclear weaponry be returned to Russia. That is, while Russia would be allowed to retain its status as a nuclear power, countries such as Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine—those brutally colonized, decimated, and victimized by generations of Kremlin colonialism—would have to divest themselves of their post-Soviet nuclear arsenal.

It was a reality that few in Washington appeared to question. “Ukraine could not keep nuclear weapons,” Steven Pifer, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, later said. “No one in the U.S. government questioned [this reality].” That’s not quite accurate; dissenting voices such as former Defense Secretary Dick Cheney argued against forcing Ukraine to give up its nuclear weapons, and even Henry Kissinger flagged that places such as Ukraine were “puzzled by [the U.S.] passion” to get Kyiv to give up its nuclear weaponry. But such concerns crumbled in the face of the supposed comity emerging between Washington and Moscow—and the United States’ expanding willingness to give the benefit of the doubt to Russia, time and again.

Indeed, the U.S. push to get Ukraine to give up its nuclear arsenal is that much more puzzling given that, even by the mid-1990s, Russian leadership was showing clear signs of the kind of revanchism that would later take root under Putin. While the United States was pressuring Ukraine to give up its nuclear weapons, the Russian military was still backing pro-Russian separatists in Moldova and had already launched a program of armed meddling in northern Georgia—as well as finalized plans for an invasion of Chechnya after that colony had the temerity to vote for independence from Moscow. Moreover, Russian President Boris Yeltsin had already “threaten[ed] Ukraine and Kazakhstan with revision of borders … if they insisted on independence,” as historian Serhii Plokhy noted, with Yeltsin’s office pointing specifically to Ukraine’s Crimea and Donbas regions as areas for potential “revision.” All of this while luminaries such as Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn publicly called for Russia to reclaim swaths of eastern Ukraine—calls that found broad appeal across Russia.

None of that, however, seemed to matter to U.S. officials. Indeed, when Ukrainian counterparts raised concerns about Russian revanchism with U.S. partners, they were viewed as “whiners,” according to a former member of the White House National Security Council. Anthony Lake, Clinton’s national security advisor, even “ridiculed Ukraine’s trepidation in giving up” its nuclear capabilities, Bogden found, adding that “Kyiv didn’t understand its true ‘long-term interest,’ Mr. Lake insisted; only he and his colleagues did.” (Ironically, former Soviet officials had a far better understanding of Ukraine’s security concerns than the Americans; as outgoing Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze said, just “one nuclear missile” in Ukraine could serve as a deterrent against Moscow.)

Eventually, the Americans got their way, steamrolling Kyiv’s concerns about Russian imperialism. The resulting Budapest Memorandum pledged nebulous “security assurances” for Kyiv, with the Kremlin declaring it would never push any “threat or use of force” against Ukraine. In return, Kyiv gave up its remaining nuclear arsenal—a move that is now not only seen by many Ukrainians as a clear misstep but that left a lingering distaste in the mouth of Ukrainian officials about America’s role in the region and even trustworthiness as a partner. “I would understand Russia’s nastiness,” then-Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk said, as Bogden discovered. “But Americans are even worse—they do not listen to our arguments.”

Decades on, America’s insistence that Ukraine divest its nuclear weapons—and give them all to Russia—is now seen as a blunder of historic proportions. Even Clinton himself has expressed regret at the move. And now, with hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians dead and Europe destabilized to a greater extent than we’ve seen in decades, the price of Washington’s push to strip Ukraine of nuclear status has become clear.

Which brings us back to Trump’s reelection and Zelensky’s recent comments. In revealing that Kyiv could pursue nuclear weapons if it doesn’t join NATO, the Ukrainian president is simply saying the quiet part out loud—all the more now that Trump will replace Biden. After all, it’s not as if Ukraine doesn’t have the history, or the technical know-how, to develop its own nuclear arsenal. If a nation such as North Korea—one now participating in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, no less—can develop its own nuclear systems, then a country such as Ukraine should have a far easier path forward. It wouldn’t happen overnight, but if NATO keeps closing the door to Ukrainian membership—and to the U.S. nuclear umbrella—then a nuclearized Kyiv would be the only logical outcome remaining.

Indeed, this was part of the impetus for NATO expansion in the post-Cold War period in the first place. As one U.S. interlocutor recently recalled, around the time the United States was forcing Ukraine to give up its nuclear weapons, Polish officials were making noise about jump-starting their own domestic nuclear program—regardless of U.S. wishes. “We talked to the Poles,” the official remembered, “and they said: ‘If you don’t let us into NATO, we’re getting nuclear weapons. We don’t trust the Russians.’” NATO, of course, expanded to include Poland in 1999, abrogating the need for a Polish nuclear arsenal—one of the welcome, and completely unappreciated, advantages to expanding NATO in Europe.

But Ukraine no longer has the luxury of waiting for NATO membership. With every passing day, and especially with the reelection of Trump, the reality increasingly dawns that if we’re to guarantee Ukrainian statehood, the West must welcome Ukraine into NATO—or it must start getting ready for Ukraine to rejoin the same nuclear club it was once a part of all those years ago.

--https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/11/07/ukraine-now-faces-a-nuclear-decision/

Eric Holder says

because Ukies now have the capability of striking deep inside Soviet territory, as demonstrated by recent series

Really? Conventional bombing = nuclear bombing now?

Then again, you are also totally unaware that the Soviet Union has been gone 32 years now.

Right, let’s give nuclear weapons to this clown puppet… or else!! It’s incredible that Foreign Policy mag has managed to argue this case.

Ukraine could develop a rudimentary nuclear bomb within months ... according to a briefing paper prepared for the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence.

The country would quickly be able to build a basic device from plutonium with a similar technology to the “Fat Man” bomb dropped on Nagasaki in 1945, the report states. “Creating a simple atomic bomb, as the United States did within the framework of the Manhattan Project, would not be a difficult task 80 years later,” the document reads.

With no time to build and run the large facilities required to enrich uranium, wartime Ukraine would have to rely instead on using plutonium extracted from spent fuel rods taken from Ukraine’s nuclear reactors.

Ukraine still controls nine operational reactors and has significant nuclear expertise despite having given up the world’s third largest nuclear arsenal in 1996. The report says: “The weight of reactor plutonium available to Ukraine can be estimated at seven tons … A significant nuclear weapons arsenal would require much less material … the amount of material is sufficient for hundreds of warheads with a tactical yield of several kilotons.”

Such a bomb would have about one tenth the power of Fat Man, the document’s authors conclude.

“That would be enough to destroy an entire Russian airbase or concentrated military, industrial or logistics installations. The exact nuclear yield would be unpredictable because it would use different isotopes of plutonium,” said the report’s author, Oleksii Yizhak, head of department at Ukraine’s National Institute for Strategic Studies, a government research centre that acts as an advisory body to the presidential office and the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine.

The plutonium would need to be imploded using “a complicated conventional explosion design, which must occur with a high detonation wave velocity simultaneously around the entire surface of the plutonium sphere,” the report reads. The technology is challenging but within Ukraine’s expertise, according to the briefing.
...

The paper, which is published by the Centre for Army, Conversion and Disarmament Studies, an influential Ukrainian military think tank, has been shared with the country’s deputy defence minister and is to be presented on Wednesday at a conference likely to be attended by Ukraine’s ministers for defence and strategic industries.

It is not endorsed by the Kyiv government but sets out the legal basis under which Ukraine could withdraw from the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT), the ratification of which was contingent on security guarantees given by the US, UK and Russia in the 1994 Budapest memorandum. The agreement stated that Ukraine would surrender its nuclear arsenal of 1,734 strategic warheads in exchange for the promise of protection.

“The violation of the memorandum by the nuclear-armed Russian Federation provides formal grounds for withdrawal from the NPT and moral reasons for reconsideration of the non-nuclear choice made in early 1994,” the paper states.

...

“You need to understand we face an existential challenge. If the Russians take Ukraine, millions of Ukrainians will be killed under occupation,” said Valentyn Badrak, director of the centre that produced the paper. “There are millions of us who would rather face death than go to the gulags.” Badrak is from Irpin, where occupying Russians tortured and murdered civilians, and he was hunted by troops with orders to kill him.

...Badrak insists Ukraine is less than a year from building its own ballistic missiles. “In six months Ukraine will be able to show that it has a long-range ballistic missile capability: we will have missiles with a range of 1,000km,” Badrak said.

Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, a former commanding officer of the UK’s Joint Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Regiment told Times Radio that Ukraine “certainly” had the technical know-how and practical wherewithal to produce a nuclear weapon.

“Trump will take note because the last thing we want is more nuclear proliferation and any sort of nuclear strike in Europe, be it from Ukrainians or the Russians,” he added.

...

Yizhak believes the threshold for developing a nuclear rearmament programme would be Putin’s troops reaching the city of Pavlohrad, a military-industrial hub about 60 miles from the present front line. Any further, and there would be a risk some of Ukraine’s largest cities, such as Dnipro and Kharkiv, could fall before the weapon was developed.

“I was surprised by the reverence the United States has for Russia’s nuclear threat. It may have cost us the war,” Yizhak said. “They treat nuclear weapons as some kind of God. So perhaps it is also time for us to pray to this God.”

...

https://www.thetimes.com/world/russia-ukraine-war/article/zelensky-nuclear-weapons-bomb-0ddjrs5hw

goofus says

Right, let’s give nuclear weapons

Give? LOL. They have 7 tonnes of plutonium. No giving of anything would be necessary. And since US, UK and USSR think they are not bound by the Budapest Memorandum, Ukraine is not bound by the NNPT anymore.

PS. Their highly-enriched uranium was taken by that "Tell Vladimir I'll be flexible" boy also known as Obama. (https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/joint-statement-president-obama-and-president-yanukovych)

... President Obama recognized Ukraine’s unique contribution to nuclear disarmament and reconfirmed that the security assurances recorded in the Budapest Memorandum with Ukraine of December 5, 1994, remain in effect. President Yanukovych announced Ukraine’s decision to get rid of all of its stocks of highly-enriched uranium by the time of the next Nuclear Security Summit ...

https://x.com/john_sipher/status/1854062637891424622