The United States has just crossed the Rubicon by authorizing, on Friday, according to sources close to the Pentagon quoted by several press agencies, the sending of cluster weapons to Ukraine, in order to support the difficult counter-offensive of Kiev on the Russian positions, in the east of the country.
This arms transfer, included in a new arms package worth US$800 million sent to Ukraine by Washington, is highly controversial, due to the nature of these bombs. Also called “cluster munitions”, they have been banned since 2008 by an international convention signed by more than a hundred states around the world. Major European democracies and Canada are among the signatories.
It’s that these “blind” weapons — even when used against Russia as part of a response to a war of aggression as sordid as it is unjustified — remain morally reprehensible, according to several defenders of human rights.
“This sharing of weapons from the United States to Ukraine must be strongly and unequivocally condemned by the international community”, drops in an interview at the Duty Tamar Gabelnick, director of the Cluster Munition Coalition, an organization that denounces the use of these cluster weapons around the world. Even if they are used in a localized and limited way in time, she continues, their “impact over a wide area” and the “trail of undetonated submunitions” they leave make them “a threat to the lives of thousands of civilians for years to come.
Under pressure from Kiev – which for several weeks has been trying to regain control over its stolen territory in the east by the Russian army – Washington would have finally agreed to overcome the reluctance by offering this type of weapon to the Ukraine.
Fearsome, the cluster bomb is designed to disintegrate in the air and release several explosive submunitions. These kinds of “mini-bombs” then spread in the targeted area, then explode to kill or seriously injure the people who are there. The problem is that nearly 40% of these submunitions do not explode. They turn into a silent threat, lurking in the environment, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). The body is a slayer of this type of weapon because of the collateral damage they generate.
Civilians and minors targeted
A third of all cluster munitions victims worldwide are children, human rights groups estimate. Of the civilians injured by these bombs, 60% were injured during their daily activities.
At the start of the war in Ukraine, Russia used this type of bomb to viciously target civilians, among other places in the countryside near Hostomel. The gesture had placed Moscow under a heavy fire of criticism.
For the jurist Robert Goldman, specialist in law and war at the American University of Washington, the United States should not however be condemned for their decision, because the country has not signed the treaty banning the use of cluster bombs. No more than Ukraine and Russia, which have never adopted this convention, strongly supported by Canada.
“However, this transfer must be made on the condition that these bombs are not launched near densely populated civilian areas,” he said in an interview. These cluster munitions can be used effectively against dug-in enemy positions or to target enemy troops near civilian infrastructure, such as dams or levees, whose structure will not be damaged by these weapons. »
The Ukrainian army relies on these bombs to compensate for its numerical disadvantage on the ground and a military under-equipment against entrenched Russian positions.
Uncomfortable position
On Friday, NATO Secretary Jens Stoltenberg dodged questions about the merits of the transfer, which puts several member countries in an uncomfortable position. Germany, France and the UK are all signatories to the cluster munitions treaty, and yet allies of Ukraine in the ongoing war. According to Mr. Stoltenberg, NATO has no “position on the subject”.
Nevertheless, the use of these bombs, including in time of war, remains “illegal under the general principles of international humanitarian law”, explains the specialist in matters of disarmament and human rights Treasa Dunworth, professor at the University of Auckland. “Their footprint, with their clusters that scatter over a wide area, disproportionately affects civilians,” she explains from New Zealand where The duty joined her this week.
The transfer of cluster weapons to Ukraine could also pose a problem for the United States, since NATO member states that have signed the treaty will not be allowed to “assist or engage in any military activity that ‘would help , would encourage or induce “anyone to engage in the use of cluster munitions,” she says, quoting the text of the convention.
Poland, often used as an intermediary between the West and Ukraine for arms transfers, did not sign the treaty. Canada, though an international leader in the movement to ban anti-personnel mines and cluster bombs from battlefields, remains rather silent on the subject.
For his part, the NATO secretary said on Friday that the world is now facing a “brutal war” in Ukraine, which is illustrated by daily attacks against civilian targets. “Cluster munitions are used by both sides,” he said at a press conference, adding that “Ukraine uses cluster munitions to defend itself”.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky welcomed the American decision, recalling that his country needed “weapons, more and more weapons, including cluster bombs” if it wanted to succeed in defeating Russia.