On whether Ukraine foresaw the impact of denuclearizing

It is hard to estimate whether Ukrainians would foresee the impact.

It is clear that Ukrainians knew they weren’t getting the exactly legally binding, really robust security guarantees they sought.

But they were told at the time that the United States and Western powers — so certainly at least the United States and Great Britain — take their political commitments really seriously. This is a document signed at the highest level by the heads of state. So the implication was Ukraine would not be left to stand alone and face a threat should it come under one.

And I think perhaps there was even a certain sense of complacency on the Ukrainian part after signing this agreement to say, “Look, we have these guarantees that were signed,” because incidentally, into Ukrainian and Russian, this was translated as a guarantee, not as an assurance.