Ukraine can build a nuclear bomb in a few months if the US cuts aid

Ukraine could develop a nuclear bomb within months. This could happen if US President-elect Donald Trump stops military aid to Kyiv.

This was reported by RBC-Ukraine with reference to The Times.

An analytical note prepared for the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine says that Ukraine will be able to quickly create a basic plutonium device using technology similar to the Fat Man bomb dropped on Nagasaki in 1945.

“Creating a simple atomic bomb, as the United States did in the Manhattan Project, would not be a difficult task even 80 years later,” the document says.

The publication explained that without time to build and launch the large facilities needed for uranium enrichment, in wartime Ukraine would have to rely on the use of plutonium extracted from spent fuel rods removed from Ukrainian nuclear reactors.

At the same time, it is worth noting that Ukraine still controls nine operating reactors and has considerable nuclear experience, despite having given up the world's third largest nuclear arsenal in 1996.

“The weight of plutonium available in Ukraine can be estimated at seven tons... A significant nuclear weapons arsenal would require much less material... The amount of material is enough for hundreds of warheads with a tactical yield of several kilotons,” the report says.

The authors of the document concluded that such a bomb would have about a tenth of the power of the Fat Man.

Author - Dmitriy Levchenko, 14/11/2024