Distracted MassesVol. 1 Issue #2 Oct. 2014 | Page 23

1991 Ukraine inherited the third largest nuclear stockpile in the world, only behind the United States and the Russian Federation.3 Although a 1994 agreement to transfer those nuclear weapons over to Russia was officially deemed a success, the problem of “loose nukes” and the nuclear black market in Ukraine has been a serious problem for the years before and after the supposed transfer of those weapons and materials.4 A 2012 article in the journal Perspective on Terrorism by Alex P. Schmid & Charlotte Spencer-Smith lists more than two dozen incidents of illegal ͵՝