{"id":14503,"date":"2023-07-13T17:10:33","date_gmt":"2023-07-13T14:10:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/?p=14503"},"modified":"2023-07-13T17:10:35","modified_gmt":"2023-07-13T14:10:35","slug":"why-cluster-munitions-in-ukraine-are-a-big-mistake-and-an-international-threat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/?p=14503","title":{"rendered":"Why cluster munitions in Ukraine are a big mistake and an international threat?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The US decision to send cluster munitions (artillery shells) to Ukraine, which was announced by the White House, is a significant setback at the level of international law, but also at the level of spreading the destructiveness of war conflicts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the why must be explained with a historical retrospective: When the Cold War ended in the early 1990s, with a “flood” from the collapse of the Warsaw Pact, the dissolution of the USSR and the many accompanying geopolitical rifts, there was an international hope that the planet can begin to hope for a more lasting and wider peace. So it was in this climate that initiatives evolved to structure a network of new international treaties and agreements for “less blood”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In fact, this effort was not made in a “vacuum”, nor as a “prototype”. But it followed and continued exactly the same negotiations and agreements that had been made during the Cold War. As paradoxical as it may sound, precisely in the decades when the tension between NATO and the Warsaw Pact was constantly increasing, the same protagonists attempted to defuse it and “control-self-control”, producing a network of restrictions on weapons systems and their dispersion and use. And to these brave and global efforts we owe a lot. Mainly that they have considerably reduced the possibility of another world war, strengthened international institutions and the culture of coexistence and understanding, while reducing as much as possible the spread and intensity of many conflicts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We recall, for example: The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (1968), the Treaty Banning Nuclear Tests (1996), the Convention Prohibiting Chemical Weapons (1993), the Convention Prohibiting Biological Weapons (1972), the Outer Space Treaty (1967), the Anti-Ballistic Treaty (1972), the SALT and START and SORT strategic arms limitation agreements (from 1972 to 2010 with many reductions in launch vehicles and nuclear warheads), the Convention on the Prohibition or Restriction of the Use of Certain Conventional Weapons (1981) and many more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The above, which were largely observed and implemented, were complemented by dozens of similar regional and multilateral treaties and conventions, withdrawing hundreds of thousands of tons of weapons from warehouses and battlefields, while establishing a network of mutual control and verification rules. Without, of course, ensuring an ideal situation, but clearly reducing both the risk of war and the “volume of blood” we would experience.<\/p>\n\n\n

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But a particularly important achievement was the destruction, inactivation, reduction, even almost extinction, of particularly dangerous and destructive weapons with brute force and improbable side effects over time. For example in chemical weapons, yesterday was an important day as it was announced that all declared stockpiles internationally have now been destroyed, in one of the biggest disarmament milestones since the 20th century. In addition to chemicals, however, many more have been withdrawn, biological weapons, anti-personnel mines, many nuclear and of course cluster munitions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The latter being artillery shells, air-to-ground bombs, rocket and rocket charges, etc. they have the following peculiarity: Each such projectile contains tens to hundreds of “submunitions” which are dispersed over a large area, so that they explode and cover with their lethal power a much larger area than the same projectile with a single explosive filling. Cluster munitions can \u201ccontaminate\u201d\u2014sweep dozens of acres each, with small bombs, but neither of which will all explode, due to malfunctions and failures, nor will they apparently exclusively hit enemy armed forces. While they are usually also scheduled to explode at a “later time”. And here, however, with a high failure rate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The result; Areas hit with such munitions remain deadly for decades after hostilities end, for decades after peace. And every year they reap hundreds of civilians who have returned to their homes, to their jobs, to their fields. They are so hideous that e.g. in Laos and Vietnam, to this day, 50 years after the end of American bombing, there are still deaths, injuries and maimings from millions of bombs that remain active. While internationally around a quarter of those killed by cluster weapons are children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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“Graveyard” of empty cluster munitions carriers dropped by Russian troops in Ukraine<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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For cluster munitions there is therefore the relevant international Convention which has been signed by 111 countries (it entered into force in 2010), while another 12 have pledged to sign it. In other words, we are not talking about a “small” agreement, but about a truly prestigious and global consensus effort to ban the production, storage and use of such ammunition. Has everyone signed it? No, and the “usual suspects” are far from it. Russia, USA, China, India as well as other major countries, which not only maintain huge stockpiles of such weapons but have also used them repeatedly. As far as we are concerned, neither we nor Turkey have signed the Convention, both invoking the right of defence. Ukraine, where the American ammunition will now be sent, has not signed it either.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What does the above mean? Not unlike what we’ve seen so far. Each such major arms limitation treaty begins as an initiative of dozens of countries, gradually gains prestige and spreads, surpasses 100 states (a milestone that at least numerically indicates that it has international appeal), and from there further implementation and adoption slows down. And it is done with difficulty and in a special, each time, “ripening” time. But as long as such treaties and conventions are observed, remain active, respected by many countries, they influence the general climate and produce positive feedback and a mood of integration.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Unpracticed submunition that can be activated years later<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

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Thus, the US, although it formally “wants” cluster weapons, has unilaterally declared that it has not been using them for many years, and that it is already withdrawing and destroying its most “old” technology copies, which had a higher failure rate in detonation (so many of their bombs remained undiscovered for decades). Furthermore, the US has denounced the use of such munitions by Assad’s troops in Syria (in successive General Assembly resolutions 67\/262, 68\/182, 69\/189, 70\/234, 71\/248, 72\/191 and 73\/182 of the United Nations). And yet, now with such a past, which if nothing else shows a certain disposition to move away from them, now Washington declares sending such ammunition to Ukraine!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So what did the US announce through Biden’s mouth? How it is a “difficult decision”, how it is done due to the exhaustion of Ukrainian ammunition, how the transfer of 155mm artillery shells of this type is temporary. To follow Jake Sullivan, the President’s National Security Adviser, in a counter role of “naivete” (outraging in its simplification) that “certainly such munitions are a danger to the civilian population, but we are giving them to the Ukrainians who are defending their country and they will protect their citizens, and they have reason to use them in such a way as to limit the danger to civilians.” In simple words and intense hypocrisy “we give them, from then on it’s their problem”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let’s be clear: American hypocrisy has a strong opponent, and even at an even higher level. The Russian threat, which has been constantly and uninterruptedly for many months reminding on the one hand how “serious Moscow is in observing the international treaties on the limitation of nuclear weapons” and how “provocative of international peace and disarmament” it is, in order to add every chance that “nuclear weapons remain a solution”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Especially Dmitry Medvedev, former president and prime minister of the country, current vice-president of the Russian Security Council and known to everyone as “the voice of his master” (Vladimir Putin), does not stop referring to nuclear weapons. Stating a few days ago that a nuclear war over Ukraine is not only possible, but “quite likely”. And to anyone watching the Russian media, calls for tactical nukes in Ukraine are so frequent, and in such brutal and absolute language, that it can only be explained as a methodical “priming” of the public, domestic and international, for the possibility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the Ukrainian battlefields, apparently both warring sides have used such weapons liberally and within urban-peri-urban areas without any qualms. And there are not a few images of piles of “distributors” of submunitions that have been collected from everywhere. With Russia giving the signal by having a very large stockpile but also apparently zero sensitivity to their use, against a country that is bombing it in a huge length and breadth, without any qualms.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Is the use, even by a defending Ukraine, of such weapons justified?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So the issue is both subtle and obvious. And in Ukraine we have not seen restraint. On the contrary, the image of the battles, their staticness that “propagandizes” the use of cluster munitions, the brutality and agony on both sides, the ongoing human slaughter, the already established war crimes, such as the massacre of Ukrainian civilians in Butsa, do not guarantee their intended use. Furthermore, if Ukraine gets cluster munitions, Russia, which is already using them without mercy, will feel free to use so much more, as it will feel “justified” to launch them. And here is our question: in the envelope of American aid to Kiev, were not other more conventional weapons found to be sent, and should these long-tragedy munitions be “excavated”? Even if the Minister of Defense of Ukraine, Oleksiy Reznikov, states that “it will only be used to liberate our internationally recognized territories and Russian territories will not be affected”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We mention the above for two reasons: The first is to emphasize that the war in Ukraine, an unjust attack by Russia and without its “coercion”, as it is naively carried out (by those who ignore the country’s negotiating tradition and its ability to ensure the interests of persuasion and in much more intense times), has returned us to a “primitivism” of diplomacy. Which is set aside by a superficial and full of cheap and threatening implications deprecation of rationality. In other words, as a defeat of the evolution of international relations, which, from World War II onwards, did not avoid local and bloody wars, but managed to maintain a world peace for 70 years and to build a more mutually complementary world and with greater internal balance and communication.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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