Sending cluster bombs creates a gap in military support for Ukraine

The new military aid package he is preparing NOW for Ukraine, he sowed controversy in the international community. Estimated at 800 million dollars — approximately 734 million euros — it will contain cluster bombsa weapon banned in more than a hundred countries due to its terrible ability to destroy military as well as civilian positions.

The announcement of the controversial measure comes amid doubts about the Ukrainian counter-offensive due to its slowness and available ammunition. “It is not enough,” Kiev’s Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov warned this week, aware that weapons production is failing to meet steady demand as the war reaches its 500th day.

The decision by Joe Biden’s administration is a testament to the voices of opposition that exist among the countries that support Ukraine in the conflict and that have already been heard on previous occasions, such as the debate — now almost forgotten — opened a few months ago regarding the shipment of F-16 fighters to Kiev forces . Cluster bombs, however, are a much more thorny problem, so much so that their use is considered a war crime and, therefore, one of the arguments for bringing Russia before the International Criminal Court.

It is not just any weapon: neither because of the surface it reaches, nor because of the small size of its submunition, capable of slipping through the smallest crack, nor because of its explosive power long after launch, which multiplies the risks to the civilian population. Actually, Convention on cluster munitions signed in 2008and collected by the United Nations, prohibits the use, development, production, acquisition, storage and transfer of these weapons, for which Washington has not reported in what quantity it will deliver to Kiev.

The USA is one of the countries that decided to stay out of this international agreement, just like Ukraine and Russia. More than a hundred nations, including Spain, France, the United Kingdom, Italy, the Netherlands, Australia or the Republic of South Africa, have decided to put an end to these bombs, which can be fired by artillery or air. Germany also ratified the document and this Friday was the first European country to show its rejection of the move by the North American executive. “I followed the media reports. The Oslo agreement applies to us», German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock agreed. Human Rights Watch (HRW) was also against it.

The position of the Alliance

NATO, in which Ukraine has been seeking a place for months, was tasked this Friday with recalling that both sides in Ukraine are already using cluster munitions. The difference is that Moscow is using it to launch an “aggressive war and invasion” and Kiev is doing it “to defend itself”, argued its Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, who, interestingly, promoted the 2008 convention when he was prime minister. Minister of Norway. Now it has left the decision to deliver the controversial bombs to the allies, since there is no common position on this issue in the military organization. Some partners have signed the agreement, while others, such as the US, remain on the sidelines.

The shipment of US cluster bombs will be the first new weapons Ukraine has received since the UK gave the go-ahead for the delivery of Storm Shadow missiles. Zelenski’s government did not decide on the decision of the United States this Friday.