US cluster munitions already in Ukraine
Mike Brest
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The controversial munitions the Biden administration decided to provide to Ukraine last week have already made it into the country.
Joint Staff Director for Operations Lt. Gen. Douglas A. Sims told reporters on Thursday that cluster munitions from the United States have already made it to Ukraine less than a week after the administration’s formal announcement.
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Given the U.S.’s diminished munition stockpiles due to the war in Ukraine, the Biden administration opted to provide Ukrainian forces with cluster munitions, of which the department said it had “hundreds of thousands” available to provide immediately.
Cluster munitions are a specific type of munition that contain tens of submunitions within it, and when it gets near the target, the munition explodes, sending the submunitions over a much more expansive area. The threats unexploded ordnance can pose to civilians years after a conflict ends led to the creation of the Convention of Cluster Munitions, which prohibits the use, production, transfer, and stockpiling of cluster munitions. More than 100 countries are a part of the treaty.
All but eight members of the NATO alliance are a part of the pact, which is why many are not following Biden’s lead, whereas the U.S., Ukraine, and Russia are not a part of the treaty.
President Joe Biden acknowledged publicly earlier this week the U.S. was “low” on munitions, while Secretary of State Antony Blinken said not providing Ukraine with cluster munitions would leave them “defenseless.”
“The stockpiles around the world and in Ukraine of the unitary munitions, not the cluster munitions, were running out, about to be depleted,” Blinken explained earlier this week. “And so, the hard but necessary choice to give them the cluster munitions amounted to this: If we didn’t do it, we don’t do it, then they will run out of ammunition. If they run out of ammunition, then they will be defenseless.”
Russian forces have used cluster munitions in Ukraine for months, which factored into the U.S.’s calculations to provide them to Ukraine.
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Ukrainian leaders provided the United States with assurances the munitions would not be used in heavily populated civilian areas and that they would track where they were used to make the process of de-mining the unexploded submunitions easier. The U.S. has already provided Ukraine with $95 million specifically for de-mining efforts.
The cluster munitions Russia has been using in Ukraine have a dud rate between 30-40%, according to DOD officials, while the munitions the U.S. will provide them will have below a 2.35% dud rate.