I’m not sure this is correct. Ukraine never “had” any nuclear arms. They were Soviet arms that happened to be situated in Ukraine. Ukraine really didn’t have any say in the matter.
If Florida seceded from the U.S., it would be ludicrous to think they’d have any standing to dictate the terms of what the U.S. Navy must do with the assets it has at the Jacksonville Naval Air Station.
Do you mean if the United States ceased to exist why would Florida not own the stuff in its own state?
By the same logic, Russia had no rightful say in the disposition of or claim to former Soviet weapons on its territory. As it was, by custom and the terms of the decree of dissolution, the old Soviet Republics like Ukraine and Russia got to keep what they had on their territory. Of course, if Ukraine had continued to keep their nukes, Russia would not have invaded.
Your analogy is flawed.
The very first line of the preamble to the Belovezha Accords stated that the “geopolitical reality” of the USSR no longer existed. At the time of it being signed, Glasnost and Perestroika applied. Moscow didn’t rule Kyiv, Minsk or any other capitol. The Supreme Soviet was like the Federal Government.
So Belovezha was in effect the equivalent of Washington being abolished and all Federal assets being disseminated to fifty free States overnight.
Which made it unequivocally clear that Soviet Union assets did not all belong to Russia. Those that sat in Belarus became Belorussian, those that sat in Ukraine became Ukrainian, and so on.
Russia never asked for all the guns, the tanks, the buildings, the bases, the missiles OR the nukes, because they never belonged to Russia in the first place. They were Soviet (union) assets.
So a better analogy would be if all US states agreed in writing that the USA no longer existed as a single federation, and then had to negotiate which state owned which assets.