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Description

Ever since Ukraine declared independence in August 1991, its main security preoccupation and challenge has been its search for identity. Nostalgic to maintain its long and close association with Russia, which has become increasingly competitive with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the European Union (EU), and at the same time eager to become a more cooperative and close partner with the Euro-Atlantic community, Ukraine has consistently tried to have it both ways. On the one hand, Ukrainian political leaders’ aspirations for membership in Euro-Atlantic institutions have been driven, in part, by the desire to solidify independence from Russia. This impulse has roots that go back to the earliest days of its independence, when the fate of ex-Soviet nuclear weapons deployed on Ukrainian territory was being decided and Kyiv appealed to the United States and its NATO Allies for security guarantees against the specter of Russian resurgence.

Document Type

Policy Brief

Publication Date

2-2009

Publication

Strategic Forum

Publisher

National Defense University Press

City

Washington, DC

Ukraine Against Herself: To Be Euro-Atlantic, Eurasian, or Neutral?

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