Know what else will be dangerous for potentially 100 years, maybe longer? Letting Russia win/hold territory. Like, folks, it’s war. The front is already riddled with mines, many in strange places because of the dam wash out.
Is this crappy and dangerous for civilians? Yes. But come on, Russian occupiers are literally committing genocide and mining the shit out of stuff right now. At least if cluster munitions help end this war then the cleanup can begin and things can start to get less dangerous.
Especially because these things will be used on Ukrainian soil. So it will be Ukranian people who will have to deal with the fallout for years/decades to come.
Nuclear bombs are very different than cluster munitions.
The Russians are already mining-remining Ukranian soil, creating an unexploded ordinance issued for generations. In fact, Russian is also using cluster munitions, so the problem with them specifically already exists.
Similar cautions/implications/unfortunate consequences for mines will be needed for unexploded cluster munitions, so this will need to be dealt with regardless of if Ukraine uses them.
The elected leaders of Ukraine have made the tactical choice to do this, have weighed the trade-offs, and convinced an inittialy-hesitant America to ship weapons. Who are you/the world to interfere with their sovereign decisions on their own land, with consequences largely confined to their own land?
If you are an American/Ukranian and oppose your country providing/receiving these munitions, contact your representatives.
Sixty percent of cluster bomb casualties are people injured while undertaking everyday activities, according to Reuters. One third of all recorded cluster munitions casualties are children.
So yes, while I keep being staunchly on the side of Ukraine and NATO helping them, this is not something I like to see.
They are looking at short term benefits, understandably. I may be naive, but still believe they can drive the Russians out with more conventional weapons. The fact that they seemingly don’t think so is actually worrying.
I’m actually really confused. This is the United States we’re talking about. They have a military budget greater than, what, the next 10 largest combined? They couldn’t figure out how to use a type of weapon that wouldn’t cause an international incident and draw condemnation from their closest allies?
like if we really had to send weapons, there are so many more that exist that won’t cause unfathomably horrific damage that is so horrific that like nearly half of the fucking world considers them warcrimes
like it’s fucking horrid that Russia’s using them, but like what the hell is wrong with the US to think “hey, we’ll use it too”
(but then again, the US and Russia did refuse to sign the CCM)
Whether or not you agree with the US sending them more cluster weapons, they’re already on use. The Cambodian PM seems completely uninformed if he thinks this is an escalation.
@Dazza So, leave the war in Ukraine lop-sided so we can absolutely ensure that the majority of those killed are Ukrainian civilians instead of Ukrainian civilians AND Russian soldiers? What kind of sense does that make?
I see your point but There’s no clear answer here.
The article raises a valid point that Cambodia has extensive history from these weapons spilling over from the Vietnam war and causing civilian fatalities way after the war ended.
My point here is that just because a war crime(s) is committed one the Russian side, that doesn’t give free reign to the Ukraine side to do the same.
@Dazza There are legitimate concerns about using cluster munitions but Ukraine is well aware of the problems they create. And unlike a 3rd world country like Vietnam, they will be better suited to mitigate those threats post-war. In the meantime, none of this matters if they lose because Russia will kill half of them anyway after the war.
So they took a vote and the people decided that they’re okay with this? Or did the administration unilaterally decide this like when they decided to cancel elections and restrict labor rights?
Russia will kill half of them anyway after the war.
Why? What sense does that make? When has there ever been any reason to believe that the goal is to kill Ukranians? This isn’t even the first time I’ve seen it said that if Russia wins (or even loses!) they’ll just wipe out all Ukranians afterwards. And neither time has there been any reasoning for why such an absurd claim should be believed.
If you truly believe this drivel, you’re doing everyone a disservice by not attempting to justify your claims. If you truly believe it and provide justification, you might just convince others to believe what you do.
do i understand correctly that you are implying ukraine, a country attempting to frame itself as a modern developed democracy, should base its policies on those of russia
You think most modern developed democracys wouldn’t busy these kind of weapons out if they were being attacked by them? It just helps that most modern developed democracys haven’t faced being invaded since WW2.
im unaware of the specific part of thr CCM that says ‘unless we get attacked’, and marking something as a warcrime usually doesnt come with the caveat ‘unless there is a war’
i also like to think that bombing several voters for every enemy combatant wouldnt sell all that well to said voters
im kidding of course, what with a third of the casualties of cluster bombs being children
kids cant vote whether theyre alive or a red chunky smear
im glad that your second favourite option, after modeling foreign policy and military tactics on those of russia, is modeling it after third graders
if a third of the folks youre killing being children is just the price youre willing to pay at least grow a spine and say so instead of pretending that russia is making you resort to shamelessly partaking in borderline warcrimes instead of using any other weapon
The US cluster munitions have a lower failure rate than the Russian versions, and also aren’t camouflaged. Also, it’s Ukraine’s choice. They probably made a difficult decision concluding they can save more lives by using them now.
It’s the US’s choice to hand them out and puts the US’s allies (Canada, etc.) in an awkward position because the treaty we signed gives us the international obligation to sanction anyone using cluster munitions.
It’s just difficult to fathom that the largest economy in the world with the greatest amount of military spending in the world doesn’t have enough manufacturing capacity to build more normal bombs than a failed Russian state.
Built on top of an artificially stimulated real estate industry. It’s not necessarily useful GDP, although I do agree that China’s economy is likely larger than the true GDP numbers indicate solely because of the RMB’s centralized control deflating Chinese currency value.
Is there any legitimacy to the claims that the Ukrainians want to disassemble these munitions to use as drone bombs? I suppose time will tell and no assurances have been made that this is the case.
The big advantage of these weapons for Ukraine is that they can be fired directly from the western -suupplied Howitzers and HIMARS they already have without needing modification. Ukraine’s problem is that they are running out of shells. Cluster munitions go further since they are area weapons.
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