Foreign Policy at BROOKINGS The TrilaterAl ProCess: The United States, Ukraine, russia and Nuclear Weapons The Brookings Institution 1775 Massachusetts Ave., NW Steven Pifer Washington, D.C. 20036 Arms Control Series brookings.edu Paper 6 • May 2011 Foreign Policy at BROOKINGS The TrilaTeral Process: The United states, Ukraine, russia and Nuclear Weapons Steven Pifer arms control series Paper 6 • May 2011 Acknowledgements I would like to express my deep gratitude to tents, characterizations and views are my own and Oleksander Chaliy, Sherman Garnett, Natalia Kra- do not necessarily represent the official positions of vets, Valeriy Kuchinskiy, William Miller, Igor Nev- the United States government. erov, Theodore Piccone, Roman Popadiuk, James Schumaker, Nikolai Sokov, Strobe Talbott and James I appreciate Gail Chalef’s assistance in the paper’s Timbie for taking the time to review earlier drafts editing and production. Finally, I am very grateful of this paper and for their helpful comments. I am to the MacArthur Foundation and Ploughshares also grateful to Paul Hilburn and the Department of Fund for their generous support for this paper and State for the expeditious review of the manuscript for other activities of the Brookings Arms Control for declassification purposes. Of course, the con- Initiative. ForeigN Policy aT BrookiNgs • A r m s C o n t ro l s e r i es The TrilaTeral Process: t h e U n i t e d s tAt es , U k rA i n e , r U ss i A A n d n uc l e A r W e A p o n s ii Table of Contents Acknowledgments ........................................................... ii 1. Executive Summary ........................................................ 1 2. Interests and Positions .................................................... 4 3. The Lisbon Protocol....................................................... 9 4. Ukrainian-Russian Negotiations............................................ 14 5. The Trilateral Negotiation ................................................ 17 6. Getting to Budapest...................................................... 25 7. Lessons Learned ......................................................... 29 Appendix I: The Trilateral Statement and Annex ................................ 34 Appendix II: The Budapest Memorandum of Security Assurances ................... 37 Endnotes.................................................................. 39 About the Author . 43 ForeigN Policy aT BrookiNgs • A r m s C o n t ro l s e r i es The TrilaTeral Process: t h e U n i t e d s tAt es , U k rA i n e , r U ss i A A n d n uc l e A r W e A p o n s iii 1. Executive Summary the trilAterAl proCess received the value of the HEU in the nuclear warheads on its territory? The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 left Soviet strategic nuclear weapons—both strategic nuclear • Eliminating the intercontinental ballistic mis- warheads and delivery systems—located on the ter- siles (ICBMs), ICBM silos, strategic bombers ritory of four newly independent states: Belarus, and nuclear infrastructure in Ukraine would Kazakhstan, Russia and Ukraine. Soviet tactical be an expensive proposition at a time when nuclear weapons were even more widely scattered. the new Ukrainian economy was sharply con- Moscow quickly secured the return of all tactical tracting; who would cover the costs of those nuclear warheads to Russia during the first half of eliminations? 1992. Moscow also in relatively short order reached bilateral understandings with Belarus and Kazakh- • How, where and under what conditions stan on the removal or elimination of the strategic would the strategic nuclear warheads, ICBMs nuclear weapon systems on the territory of those and bombers be eliminated? countries. Bilateral Ukrainian-Russian negotiations grappled The process with Ukraine proved more difficult, as with these issues in the months after the fall of the Kyiv sought to achieve particular objectives before Soviet Union. They began to identify solutions to giving up what was then the third largest nuclear ar- some questions but never successfully came to clo- senal in the world. Among other things, the Ukrai- sure. The September 1993 Massandra summit be- nian government wanted acceptable answers to four tween Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk and key questions: Russian President Boris Yeltsin initially appeared to have achieved a formula for the transfer of the strate- • Possession of nuclear weapons was seen to gic nuclear warheads to Russia and the resolution of confer certain security benefits; what guaran- all ancillary issues. The bilateral deal, however, col- tees or assurances would there be for Ukraine’s lapsed almost immediately. sovereignty and territorial integrity after it gave up strategic nuclear arms? Getting the nuclear weapons out of Ukraine topped the U.S. agenda with that country in its first years • The strategic nuclear warheads had commer- of independence. Washington wanted the nuclear cial value in the form of the highly-enriched warheads transferred to Russia but was sympathetic uranium (HEU) they contained, which could to some of the Ukrainian government’s concerns be blended down into low-enriched uranium and actively discussed the issue—and related ques- (LEU) and used in fuel rods for nuclear pow- tions such as compensation and security assuranc- er reactors; how would Ukraine ensure that it es—separately with both sides from early 1992 on. ForeigN Policy aT BrookiNgs • A r m s C o n t ro l s e r i es The TrilaTeral Process: t h e U n i t e d s tAt es , U k rA i n e , r U ss i A A n d n uc l e A r W e A p o n s 1 The first trilateral meeting of American, Russian and lessons leArned Ukrainian diplomats took place in August 1993. Originally agnostic as to how the question would After the Trilateral Statement and Budapest Memo- be resolved—as the result of a bilateral Ukrainian- randum were signed, implementation proceeded Russian negotiation or of a process involving the relatively smoothly. By June 1, 1996, Ukraine had United States—Washington concluded in the after- transferred the last of the nuclear warheads on its ter- math of the Massandra summit that it would have to ritory to Russia for elimination, and the last START become more directly involved in brokering a solu- I-accountable strategic nuclear delivery vehicle, an tion. Both the Russians and Ukrainians welcomed SS-24 missile silo, was eliminated in 2001. More U.S. participation, the Russians because they under- broadly, Ukraine’s denuclearization opened the way stood that Washington shared their goal of getting to an expanded U.S-Ukrainian bilateral relation- the nuclear weapons out of Ukraine, the Ukrainians ship. Among other things, by the end of the 1990s, because they believed that, with American officials Ukraine was among the top recipients in the world engaged in the process, they would have a friend in of U.S. assistance. Denuclearization also removed court and could achieve a deal that better answered what would have been a major impediment to their four key questions. Ukraine’s development of relations with Europe. In 1997, NATO and Ukraine agreed to a “distinctive The trilateral discussions accelerated in December, partnership” and established the NATO-Ukraine producing the Trilateral Statement and accompany- Council. ing annex, signed by Kravchuk, Yelstin and U.S. Pres- ident Bill Clinton in Moscow on January 14, 1994. Several factors explain the success of the trilateral Those documents provided that Ukraine would trans- process. They include: fer all strategic warheads on its territory to Russia for elimination and, in return, would receive security as- The ability to find a solution that met the inter- surances, compensation for the commercial value of ests of all parties. The trilateral process succeeded the HEU, and Nunn-Lugar assistance to help with because it found a “win-win-win” solution that met the disposal of ICBMs, ICBM silos, bombers and the minimum requirements of all three participants. other infrastructure on Ukrainian territory. Perhaps The minimum requirements for Russia and the as importantly but less tangibly, the Trilateral State- United States were that Ukraine transfer or eliminate ment removed what would have been a major imped- the strategic offensive arms, including the strategic iment to Ukraine’s development of normal relations warheads, on its territory. While Washington shared with the United States and the West. Moscow’s minimum requirements, it also wanted to resolve the nuclear issue so that it could move to a The final act of the trilateral process played out in regular relationship with Ukraine. For Ukraine, the autumn 1994, with Ukraine’s accession to the Non- minimum requirement was good answers to ques- proliferation Treaty (NPT) as a non-nuclear weap- tions regarding security assurances for Ukraine, ons state. Clinton, Yeltsin and newly-elected Ukrai- compensation for the economic value of the HEU nian President Leonid Kuchma met on December in the nuclear warheads, assistance for eliminat- 5 in Budapest on the margins of the Conference ing the nuclear legacy on Ukrainian territory, and on Security and Cooperation in Europe summit. conditions for the elimination of the strategic mis- Kuchma transmitted Ukraine’s instrument of ac- siles, bombers and warheads. The sides’ minimum cession to the NPT, the Strategic Arms Reduction requirements allowed space for a solution acceptable Treaty (START I) entered into force, and the United to all, and Kyiv concluded that 1994 was the right States and Russia, joined by the United Kingdom, time to cash in its nuclear chip. U.S. engagement extended security assurances to Ukraine in what be- made that easier for Kyiv by helping to rectify an came known as the Budapest Memorandum of Se- inherent imbalance between Ukraine and Russia. curity Assurances. ForeigN Policy aT BrookiNgs • A r m s C o n t ro l s e r i es The TrilaTeral Process: t h e U n i t e d s tAt es , U k rA i n e , r U ss i A A n d n uc l e A r W e A p o n s 2 The importance of “doing what works.” The tri- The importance of understanding the other side’s lateral process succeeded because the sides were pre- needs.