#  Inheriting the Bomb: The Collapse of the USSR and the Nuclear Disarmament of Ukraine 

 



####  calendar\_today Date and Time 

 **October 18, 2023** 

 05:00PM - 06:30PM EDT 

####  pin\_drop Location 

 **Room K-354, CGIS-Knafel (North Building), 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA 02138**  



 

 [ Register for Zoom arrow\_circle\_right ](https://harvard.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_RBPjOSpsQ1GXyaR7kRzNxw) 

 



 

  
**Book Talk** with author [**Mariana Budjeryn**](https://www.belfercenter.org/person/mariana-budjeryn), Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Response by [**Serhii Plokhii**](https://huri.harvard.edu/people/serhii-plokhii), Mykhailo S. Hrushevs'kyi Professor of Ukrainian History and Director of the Ukrainian Research Institute, Harvard University

Moderated by [**Emily Channell-Justice**](https://huri.harvard.edu/people/emily-channell-justice), Director of the Temerty Contemporary Ukraine Program at the Ukrainian Research Institute, Harvard University

**In-Person and Online** via Zoom Webinar (live). Registration is required to attend online.

**Books will be available for purchase at the event (Cash, Check, or Venmo). $25 with discount for in-person attendees.**

## Book Description

*The collapse of the Soviet Union unleashed the specter of the largest wave of nuclear proliferation in history. Why did Ukraine ultimately choose the path of nuclear disarmament?*

   ![Inheriting the Bomb_Budjeryn](/sites/g/files/omnuum4931/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/huri/files/inheriting_the_bomb_lo_res.jpg?itok=21pUem0y) 

 

The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 left its nearly 30,000 nuclear weapons spread over the territories of four newly sovereign states: Belarus, Kazakhstan, the Russian Federation, and Ukraine. This collapse cast a shadow of profound ambiguity over the fate of the world's largest arsenal of the deadliest weapons ever created. In [*Inheriting the Bomb*](https://www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/12715/inheriting-bomb), Mariana Budjeryn reexamines the history of nuclear predicament caused by the Soviet collapse and the subsequent nuclear disarmament of the non-Russian Soviet successor states. Although Belarus and Kazakhstan renounced their claim to Soviet nuclear weapons, Ukraine proved to be a difficult case: with its demand for recognition as a lawful successor state of the USSR, a nuclear superpower, the country became a major proliferation concern. And yet by 1994, Ukraine had acceded to the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) as a non-nuclear-weapon state and proceeded to transfer its nuclear warheads to Russia, which emerged as the sole nuclear successor of the USSR.

How was this international proliferation crisis averted? Drawing on extensive archival research in the former Soviet Union and the United States, Budjeryn uncovers a fuller and more nuanced narrative of post-Soviet denuclearization. She reconstructs Ukraine's path to nuclear disarmament to understand how its leaders made sense of the nuclear armaments their country inherited. Among the various factors that contributed to Ukraine's nuclear renunciation, including diplomatic pressure from the United States and Russia and domestic economic woes, the NPT stands out as a salient force that provided an international framework for managing the Soviet nuclear collapse. \[[Source](https://www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/12715/inheriting-bomb)\]

## About the Speaker

   ![Mariana Budjeryn](/sites/g/files/omnuum4931/files/styles/hwp_1_1__360x360_scale/public/huri/files/budjeryn_photo.jpg?itok=Efb7E-8n) 

 

Mariana Budjeryn is a Senior Research Associate with the Project on Managing the Atom (MTA) at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center. Formerly, she held appointments as a Stanton Nuclear Security Fellow with MTA, and the International Security Program, a fellow at Harvard's Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, and as a visiting professor at Tufts University and Peace Research Institute Frankfurt. Mariana’s research focuses on the international non-proliferation regime, arms control, nuclear crises, and post-Soviet nuclear history. Mariana leads MTA’s diversity, inclusion, and belonging program, including the [Atomic Voices](https://www.belfercenter.org/event-series/mta-atomic-voices-series#:~:text=The%20Project%20on%20Managing%20the,in%20nuclear%20research%20and%20policy.) seminar series that provides a forum for marginalized voices and perspectives in the nuclear field. She is an affiliate of the Davis Center Negotiations Task Force, where she is one of the architects and organizers of [ACONA](https://www.armscontrolnegotiationacademy.org/) (Arms Control Negotiations Academy), an immersive course in arms control history, technology, and negotiations skills. Mariana’s research and analytical contributions appeared in the *Journal of Cold War Studies*, *Nonproliferation Review*, *World Affairs Journal, Foreign Affairs*, *Washington Post*, *Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, War on the Rocks, Arms Control Today,* and in the publications of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars where she is a Global Fellow. Mariana is the author of [*Inheriting the Bomb: The Collapse of the USSR and the Nuclear Disarmament of Ukraine*](https://www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/12715/inheriting-bomb#:~:text=weapons%20ever%20created.-,In%20Inheriting%20the%20Bomb,%20Mariana%20Budjeryn%20reexamines%20the%20history%20of,non-Russian%20Soviet%20successor%20states.) (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023). She holds a Ph.D. in Political Science and an M.A. in International Relations from Central European University (formerly) in Budapest, Hungary, and a B.A. in Political Science from the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy in Ukraine. \[[Source](https://www.belfercenter.org/person/mariana-budjeryn)\]

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*This event is organized by Harvard's* [*Ukrainian Research Institute*](https://huri.harvard.edu/) *(HURI) as part of the weekly Seminar in Ukrainian Studies public event series and* [*Temerty Contemporary Ukraine Program*](https://huri.harvard.edu/temerty-contemporary-ukraine-program)*.*

*Persons with disabilities who wish to request accommodations or who have questions about access, please contact Megan Duncan Smith, HURI Programs Coordinator, at* [*duncansmith@fas.harvard.edu*](mailto:duncansmith@fas.harvard.edu) *at least two weeks in advance of the session.*

*Watch videos of past HURI events on our* [*YouTube Channel*](https://www.youtube.com/user/huriyt) *and* [*subscribe*](https://web.lists.fas.harvard.edu/mailman/lists/huri-events-list.lists.fas.harvard.edu/) *to our email list to receive announcements about events and other activities.*



 

 



 

 See also:- [ Book Talk ](/event-type/book-talk)
- [ Seminar in Ukrainian Studies ](/event-type/seminar-ukrainian-studies)
- [ Contemporary Ukraine ](/fields-expertise/contemporary-ukraine)
- [ Temerty Contemporary Ukraine Program ](/program/temerty-contemporary-ukraine-program)
 
 

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