Is President Joe Biden’s decision to transfer cluster munitions to Ukraine unethical, as human rights advocates say? Or is it a military necessity, as foreign policy experts believe? We take a closer look.
"We recognize the cluster munitions create a risk of civilian harm from unexploded ordnance," National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said at a White House briefing."This is why we’ve deferred the decision for as long as we could. But there is also a massive risk of civilian harm if Russian troops and tanks roll over Ukrainian positions and take more Ukrainian territory and subjugate more Ukrainian civilians, because Ukraine does not have enough artillery.
"The United States has committed over 2 million artillery shells to Ukraine, so U.S. stocks are now very low," Cancian said."There is an ‘alternative warhead’ … that has effects similar to cluster munitions, but without the dud problem. However, the United States is already shipping those to Ukraine, and, because they went into production relatively recently, inventories are not large.
Activists and international delegations stand next to cluster bomb units Sept. 12, 2011. at a Lebanese military base. As mentioned, Ukraine wouldn’t be the first side in the conflict to use cluster munitions: Russia"They already have cluster munitions — nasty, old, unreliable Soviet munitions — and have been using them already," Pike said.
"Zelenskyy was democratically elected by a wide margin in a free and fair election, and is fighting a war that is supported by an overwhelming majority of the Ukrainian people," Pike said."The Ukrainian government is prepared to take the risk because it places higher priority at this time on defeating the Russian military," Pifer said.
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