Comment & Debate
Ann De Ron. “98 Percent of Cluster Bomb Victims are Civilians”. Inter Press Service. 3 Nov. 2006 – It is estimated by Handicap International that there are more than 100,000 victims of cluster bombs worldwide and they declared with evidences that “these bombs kill mainly civilians”. The U.S. has used 13 million cluster sub-munitions old stocks of cluster bombs in Iraq war and Israel used 4 million cluster sub-munitions in Lebanon. Those cluster bombs are old stocks so that so many sub-munitions have not exploded immediately on impact and will become potential killer of local civilians lie all over the place.
“NATO cluster bombs kill 100 Albanians in Kosovo: Where is the outrage?”. World Socialist Website. 15 May 1999 – During the the US-NATO war against Yugoslavia,NATO dropped eight cluster bombs which killed at least 100 Albanian Kosovar refugees, most of them women and children,which created the worst single atrocity since the US-NATO war against Yugoslavia began seven weeks ago. Each cluster bomb releases up to 200 bomblets which shower a wide area with explosive charges. So the impact of eight on a small village created a charnel house.
Anthony Arnove. “Cluster Bombs: The Civilian Impact”. March 2002 – Washington Post reported that in the Gulf War, despite the claims about precision missiles, 70 percent of U. S. bombs missed their targets and only 7 percent of the munitions used were so-called smart bombs, during “the most intense aerial bombardment in history,”. Those bombs that did hit their intended target often hit civilian infrastructure, including bridges, water supply facilities, and power plants.
But in the annals of horrific weapons, cluster bombs deserve a special place. Cluster bombs scatter their ordnance over a broad area; include as many as 200 small “bomblets” that routinely do not explode on impact; and remain to exact a deadly toll for years. Some cluster bombs are built with “sprinklers” that are designed to scatter the bomblets over an even wider area than traditional models.
Washington Post.com website, not carried in the newspaper, William M. Arkin noted that the U. S. has increasingly used “cluster bombs that have no real aimpoint and that kill and wound innocent civilians for years to come.”
Of the 28 JSOW cluster bombs fired on Iraq by navy aircraft on February 16, 2001, “Pentagon sources say that 26…missed their aimpoints,” according to Arkin, a 93 percent failure rate. ”
Afghanistan is now littered with unexploded cluster bombs, adding to the risk to civilians who also routinely die from the estimated 10 million land mines that remain from previous wars. According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, an average of 88 Afghans die every month because of land mine injuries.
Cluster Munition Coalition – WHY IS A BAN ON CLUSTER MUNITIONS NECESSARY? Simply put, cluster munitions kill and injure too many civilians. The weapon caused more civilian casualties in Iraq in 2003 and Kosovo in 1999 than any other weapon system.
Cluster munitions stand out as the weapon that poses the gravest dangers to civilians since antipersonnel mines, which were banned in 1997. Yet there is currently no provision in international law to specifically address problems caused by cluster munitions. Israel’s massive use of the weapon in Lebanon in August 2006 resulted in more than 200 civilian casualties in the year following the ceasefire and served as the catalyst that has propelled governments to attempt to secure a legally-binding international instrument tackling cluster munitions in 2008.
“Israeli Cluster Munitions Hit Civilians in Lebanon”. Human Rights Watch. 24 July 2006