Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Give nukes to Ukraine, even pretend ones and war will end in minutes This is the wrong answer. But it's clear non-proliferation has failed. If Ukraine had kept its nukes from the 90s, this wouldn't have happened. It would have had the ability to credibly threaten that it had reverse engineered the arming mechanisms.
My understanding is that they were always in Russian control, kind of like how the US keeps nuclear assets at overseas bases. Not only did the Russians have the codes, but they had soldiers in physical control with the ability to scuttle the devices.
No. The 43rd Rocket Army "became part of the Armed Forces of Ukraine" on 6 December 1991 [1]. Unlike American warheads, which are on U.S. bases, those were Russian warheads on Ukrainian bases.