Finally, Ukraine, as well as Belarus and Kazakhstan, obtained security assurances from the NPT depositary states in the now-infamous Budapest Memorandum signed on December 5, 1994 (see Budjeryn 2014). France and China extended similar assurances in separate statements. At the time, Ukrainian leaders knew full well that these assurances were not the legally binding guarantees they sought. This was not for the lack of trying on Ukraine’s part: negotiations on security guarantees had proceeded since mid-1992, but Ukrainians found it virtually impossible to exert from the United States the kind of security commitments it pledged to its NATO allies and strategic partners. Russia would agree to recognize Ukraine’s borders only within the borders of the Russian-dominated Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), a condition Ukraine refused to accept and which was eventually lifted in the Budapest Memorandum. After the signature of the Memorandum, Ukraine’s first president Leonid Kravchuk stated: “If tomorrow Russia goes into Crimea, no one will even raise an eyebrow” (The Moscow Times 1994).