Ukrainian Civil-Military Relations and the Military Impact of the Ukrainian Economic Crisis

The election of Leonid Kuchma as president of Ukraine on 10 July 1994 ended the post-Soviet transition period associated with Leonid Kravchuk, who had been elected on the same day that Ukraine’s December 1991 referendum indicated 90 percent support for independence from the former USSR. President Kravchuk had played a key role in arranging the meeting of the heads of state of the three East Slavic former republics—Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine—that led to the disintegration of the former USSR and its replacement by the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). It was also Ukraine’s drive to nationalize all former Soviet security forces on its territory that initiated the disruption of the former Soviet armed forces.