I’m to blame for Russia’s invasion: Bill Clinton admits ‘terrible’ mistake in forcing Ukraine to give up its nuclear weapons in 1994 – and Putin would not have attacked if they still had them

• The former president suggested Kyiv should have kept its atomic deterrent
• Speaking to Ireland’s RTE, Clinton said Putin had long planned to invade Ukraine
• He also took a swipe at Republicans seeking to end aid to the war-torn country

Bill Clinton has confessed that he made a ‘terrible’ mistake in forcing Ukraine to give up its nuclear weapons in 1994.

The disgraced former president, whose term in office was marred by a sex scandal with a White House intern, demanded Kyiv surrender its atomic arms in a deal with Moscow.

But in a rare show of humility, Clinton admitted Russia’s illegal invasion would never have happened if the Ukrainians had been allowed to keep their nuclear deterrent.

The 42nd president of the United States now admits he was wrong to insist that a once-again independent Ukraine should surrender its Soviet-era stockpiles

‘I feel terrible about it because Ukraine is a very important country and I feel a personal stake because I got them to agree to give up their nuclear weapons,’ he told Irish network RTE.  

‘None of them believe that Russia would have pulled this stunt if Ukraine still had their weapons,’ the 76-year-old added. 

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, a once-again independent Ukraine possessed the third-largest atomic arsenal in the world with some 1,900 nuclear warheads.

The international agreement to give them up was struck in January 1994 with then Russian leader Boris Yeltsin.

The deal also included commitments from the Kremlin to respect Ukrainian independence.

But those pledges were first ignored by Vladimir Putin when he seized Crimea and the eastern Donbas region in 2014.

Clinton said that Putin never planned to stick to the deal agreed with Boris Yeltsin and Leonid Kravchuk, Ukraine’s president at the time, in Moscow

The Russian tyrant dismissed them yet again when he launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine last year.

‘I knew that President Putin did not support the agreement President Yeltsin made never to interfere with Ukraine’s territorial boundaries – an agreement he made because he wanted Ukraine to give up their nuclear weapons,’ Clinton said.

‘They were afraid to give them up because they thought that’s the only thing that protected them from an expansionist Russia,’ he added.

And in a thinly-veiled swipe at would-be Republican nominee Donald Trump, the two-term ex-commander-in-chief said taxpayers should continue to back Kyiv’s armed forces.

Clinton, seen here at a White House event with Joe Biden in February, told Ireland’s RTE network that Washington should stand by Ukraine and its bid to expel Russian invaders from its territory 

Joe Biden’s administration has stumped up more than $77 billion in financial aid to the war-torn country, according to German think-tank the Kiel Institute for the World Economy   

But that has angered some Republican lawmakers who say that those sums would be better spent at home fighting crime and illegal immigration.

‘I think what Putin did was very wrong, and I believe Europe and the United States should continue to support Ukraine,’ Clinton said.

‘There may come a time when the Ukrainian government believes that they can think of a peace agreement they could live with, but I don’t think the rest of us should cut and run on them,’ he added.

Earlier this year, Trump said he had an ‘easy negotiation’ strategy to end the conflict within 24 hours but refused to be drawn on the details of his peace plan

Trump has hinted that he would force Ukraine to the negotiating table if the war is not over by the end of next year’s presidential election.

‘If it’s not solved, I will have it solved in 24 hours with (President Volodymyr) Zelensky and with Putin, and there’s a very easy negotiation to take place,’ he told Fox News last month.

The real estate mogul, who was charged with 34 felonies in Manhattan on Tuesday, has also said supporting Ukraine is not a vital US strategic interest.

‘That is why Europe should be paying far more than we are, or equal,’ he said.

DailyMail.com has approached the Ukrainian government for comment.  

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