Russia was in full agreement with The West and Ukraine that no aggressions would occur against Ukraine when they surrendered the Soviet Nuclear Missiles out of Ukraine with the dissolution of the USSR.
Russia broke the treaty after the nukes were removed and the Pro-Russian Ukraine President was driven from power after the Maiden killings.
Donald J. Trump is completely wrong in his dialogue regarding what occurred in Ukraine during the time President Obama was there. The interior of Ukraine under Yanukovych was completely hostile and part of the driving force of what occurred with the demonstrations in the Maidan.
To begin, Ukraine was not a member of NATO at that time. Any invasion by The West against the Russians would cause deaths of innocent people.
Viktor Yanukovych had disarmed the Ukraine national military. Instead, he placed militias with the oligarchs throughout the country. The intolerance to this invasive build-up of militias scared the people of Ukraine. Besides that Yanukovych managed to end the 2004 Urkaine Constitution. There was a lot of tension between Yanukovych and the Ukraine people. Russia, including Putin, was a chronic power player inside the country of Ukraine and used it as a political issue for Russian elections.
BUT, PRIMARILY, THE PEOPLE OF UKRAINE WERE PROMISED BY RUSSIA TO LEAVE THE COUNTRY ALONE AND IN PEACE FOR RELIQUISHING IT'S NUCLEAR CAPACITY.
Russia violated that when it moved into Crimea and then Eastern Ukraine at the Russian border. It was a no-win situation. There was no Ukraine national military with any type of capacity to move against the oligarch militias as they manifested throughout the country. It was a waiting game and a slow progression to return military capacity to the national military.
The world was walking on eggshells to move Ukraine back into it's democracy and a strong national military.
Trump revises the entire situation to provide political talking points. Vladimir Putin and Viktor Yanukovych are to blame for the continued ILLEGAL OCCUPATION of Ukraine. The annexation is unilateral and most countries in the world do not recognize it. There were no national initiatives with the entire of Ukraine people giving their blessing to the annexation, it was a hostile act against peaceful sovereign people.
There were two subsequent treaties signed by Ukraine and Russia, Minsk I and Minsk II and they are both in violation by Russia.
I might point out the most recent presidential elections in Ukraine clearly illustrate the same gregarious people and their longing for peace in their country.
February 28, 2019
By Ron Synovitz
With tensions rising in Crimea (click here) and pro-Russian forces controlling the peninsula's main airports, Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk has called on Russia to "not violate the Budapest Memorandum." So what is the "Budapest Memorandum" and what does it have to do with Crimea?
What exactly is the "Budapest Memorandum"?
The "Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances" is a diplomatic memorandum that was signed in December 1994 by Ukraine, Russia, the United States, and the United Kingdom.
It is not a formal treaty, but rather, a diplomatic document under which signatories made promises to each other as part of the denuclearization of former Soviet republics after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Under the memorandum, Ukraine promised to remove all Soviet-era nuclear weapons from its territory, send them to disarmament facilities in Russia, and sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. Ukraine kept these promises.
In return, Russia and the Western signatory countries essentially consecrated the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine as an independent state. They did so by applying the principles of territorial integrity and nonintervention in 1975 Helsinki Final Act -- a Cold War-era treaty signed by 35 states including the Soviet Union -- to an independent post-Soviet Ukraine.
