How Ukraine is exploiting Biden’s cluster bomb gamble
washingtonpost.com
cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/5026301
Full article: https://imgur.com/a/JVKx6Rn
Selected excerpt:
The cluster munitions the Biden administration is sending to Ukraine are much older, and pose an even greater threat to civilians. The bomb is called the dual-purpose improved conventional munition, or DPICM, and production of it ended in the 1990s. The longer the munition stays in storage, the higher the “dud rate” — the share of bomblets that remain unexploded after a cluster bomb is fired. Biden’s decision to send the munitions — a choice he described as “difficult” — bypassed a U.S. law prohibiting the transfer of cluster munitions with a dud rate of more than 1 percent.
They always wait until near the end to tell the reader Russia has been using even higher dud rate cluster bombs since the beginning.
On the other hand, it is good to hear the US plans to help with UXO remediation.
I was troubled by his decision to send cluster munitions to Ukraine as well. However, one important fact swung me in favor of it: the Ukrainians are deploying said munitions on their own soil, meaning it's their civilians that will be in danger of being harmed by them in the future, not the civilians of a foreign country. Ukraine thus has an interest in being careful and cleaning up the bomblets after the war is over (assuming they win and keep their territory). The main problem I have with these bombs and land mines is that they're typically deployed by an invading army and thus pose a threat to civilians they don't give a damn about. When it's on your own ground, that's another story entirely. Ukraine is using these munitions out of desperation, and if they want to gamble their people's lives on it, that's their choice. I totally understand it.
While I can agree on some points, I would say it is not 'their choice,' it's their government's choice. I'm sure there are or will be plenty of Ukrainians who are very much not in favour of this after they lose a limb or a child. It's a shitty situation so I'm not sure I could blame their government. But I feel for the civilians.
I feel for their civilians too, but it's still a very big difference between the Russians planting bombs on their land and their own government. Their own government was theoretically elected by them, meaning they represent them. If said populace is unhappy with how their government wages this war, they are free to hold them to task. Yes, there are still issues to address there, but it's not the same thing.
War is messy. Sometimes you don't have many choices to go with and just have to pick from the least worst options. Know what else is a threat to civilians? Getting invaded by the Russians.
Especially when you use said cluster munitions on your own soil that has already been mined by the russians anyways, you could even argue that the increased threat to your own civilians once they move back into the areas is small-ish. The threat is high, but it's not much higher than before.
True, when you go from 10x shitty to 11x shitty it's barely noticeable.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
KHARKIV REGION, Ukraine — A few feet away from a pile of U.S.-made cluster bombs, an earsplitting boom goes off 50 times a day, marking the latest volley from a Ukrainian artillery crew seeking to hold back advancing Russian forces.
Human Rights Watch called Biden’s decision “profoundly troubling.” Germany, France, Canada, the Netherlands and several other NATO allies publicly opposed the move, citing the potential for civilian casualties.
“Cleaning up unexploded ordnance is going to require a huge effort — not because of U.S. cluster munitions but because of the incredible amount of mines planted by the enemy,” Andriy Besedin, the head of the Kupyansk city military administration, said in an interview.
“Regardless of whether Ukraine fires these munitions, these areas will require significant remediation post-conflict, and we will provide assistance to support future Ukrainian demining efforts,” said a senior U.S. official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive military matter.
The controversy spurred the Obama administration to place a hold on transfers of the munitions to the kingdom, a decision that cut into the industry’s profits and resulted in the last U.S. manufacturer of cluster bombs, Textron Systems, to halt production in August of that year, citing “regulatory challenges.”
Since his comments, there have been several reports of Russian cluster bomb attacks across Ukraine, including an assault on a Ukrainian training ground near Druzhkivka that killed one soldier and injured a team of journalists from the German news outlet Deutsche Welle.
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