Biden Poised To Ship Cluster Bombs To Ukraine

The Biden administration is considering providing Ukraine with cluster bombs and may announce this decision in early July, NBC News reported.

Photo Insert: The Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM) treaty prohibits cluster munitions' use, production, acquisition, transfer, and stockpiling and requires the destruction of stockpiles.

“We have been thinking about dual-purpose improved conventional munitions (DPICMa) for a long time,” Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Friday. “Yes, of course, there’s a decision-making process ongoing.” DPICMs are surface-to-surface warheads that burst and disperse deadly multiple, smaller bomblets.

Many bomblets fail to explode on initial impact, leaving duds that can wound and kill, like land mines, for many years.

DPICMs can be fired from US howitzer artillery systems provided to Ukraine. Ukraine has asked the US for DPICMs since last year, but the idea has met resistance.

More than 120 countries, including 23 NATO countries, ban them under the Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM) treaty.

CCM prohibits cluster munitions' use, production, acquisition, transfer, and stockpiling and requires the destruction of stockpiles. The US, Ukraine, and Russia are not signatories to the treaty.

A total of 21 member organizations of the US Cluster Munition Coalition (USCMC) backed by at least 14 Senate Democrats and 17 NGO networks have urged US President Joe Biden not to send DPICMs to Ukraine even as Russia has been using the same since February 2022, killing civilians as well as combatants.

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