Cluster Munitions

Posted by Benjamin on: 04.04.2007 /

Cluster munitions are larger shells or casings which contain dozens to hundreds of submunitions. They are designed to be dropped from aircraft or launched from artillery, and then the larger casing opens in the air and the submunitions disperse over a wide area, and then explode on impact. The problem is that the submuntions have a relatively huge failure rate (10 to 40+%), so that one ends up with submunitions which have not yet exploded littering the landscape, basically acting as antipersonnel land mines. These can sit dormant for years and years, and for instance in Laos, where the U.S. bombed heavily with cluster munitions in the 60’s and 70’s, every year farmers find and accidentally set them off while tilling the soil to grow food, or children find them while exploring and think they are toys and then get maimed or killed. This is still happening 40 years after they were originally dropped, and the Red Cross estimates that 11,000 civilians have been killed in Laos alone since the end of the war.

Despite these facts, both the U.S. and other western countries continue to stockpile, produce, and deploy these indiscriminate weapons. The Red Cross, Human Rights Watch, Handicap International, the Mennonite Central Committe, and other organizations have been calling for a ban on these weapons, and these and other NGO’s continue to do amazing, but far from sufficient, work around the world cleaning up this unexploded ordnance. The cleanup is a laborious, rather scary work–you can imagine! The unexploded submunitions must be found and removed without exploding them, and then carefully set off in a controlled safe fashion.

Israel’s use of cluster munitions, including U.S. made weapons, last year against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon has drawn a lot of international attention to this issue. In February this year, in Oslo, 46 countries (unfortunately, but rather obviously, not including the United States) signed an agreement to conclude by 2008 a legally binding treaty banning the use, production, transfer, and stockpiling of cluster munitions. This was, IMHO, a huge step forward. Much, however remains to be done. In February this year, 4 senators introduced the cluster munitions civilian protection act (S. 594) in the U.S. senate, which certainly moves the U.S. in the right direction . I would urge our U.S. readers to contact your senators and ask them to support this bill.

Here is another well written article about the subject

Here is a video on youtube (from Human rights watch) about it.

As I became increasingly aware of the fact that we continue to use these weapons which indiscriminately kill civilians and soldiers, adults and children, and which continue to kill for decades, I became increasingly disturbed by the fact that we are still making and using such weapons. What is your reaction?