Cluster munitions are banned in many parts of the world for a reason, has the West and Ukraine really considered what sending cluster bombs to Ukraine really means?
After over a year of war in Ukraine it is easy to get desensitised to all the military aid the West sends. Still, the fact that the US is planning to send artillery-fired cluster munitions is remarkable. Partly for the ethical implications of sending weapons which are widely considered to cause unacceptable harm to civilians. And partly because it implies that American stocks of regular artillery ammunition is being drawn down too fast for Washington’s comfort. According to an article in The Economist Ukraine’s army uses the same amount of shells America produces in a month in 10 days. The use of cluster munitions requires the West and Ukraine to face a dilemma I doubt either party has spent enough time and energy thinking about.
It's very difficult to know how the ammunition situation looks for the Russians, but given that there have not been any Western reporting noting a slowdown in Russian shelling I think it’s fair to assume that the they are not firing at a rate which will completely deplete their reserves. As I’ve been saying since the war started, it appears like Ukraine would be at quite the disadvantage were it not for Western aid, so if America is sending highly controversial weaponry like cluster munitions for the sake of not running out of munitions rather than for the weaponry’s effectiveness or tactical use is a deeply worrying sign.
I personally don’t trust Ukraine to act in the most ethical manner possible, and while I understand and sympathise with Ukraine’s reasons for its sometimes underhanded tactics of targeting dual use infrastructure like the Kerch Strait bridge, I’m still worried by the fact that Kyiv is being supplied with cluster munitions. It’s true that both sides having been using former Soviet cluster munitions since the war began, but supplying new cluster munitions will inevitably lead to new civilian deaths in addition to the civilian harms the already used munitions would cause.
There is a classic saying about international law that most states follow most laws most of the time. Laws of armed conflict is no exception and while neither Ukraine nor Russia nor even the US are parties to the treaty banning the use of cluster munitions it is still a bad idea to continue using cluster bombs. Laws of war are inherently and necessarily aspirational laws meant to guide us to a less brutal future by setting a positive example rather than spelling out disciplinary actions to take should one of the parties break the law. The ban on cluster munitions is trying to establish a norm where undue harm to civilians is minimised, and the fact that the Russians continue to use those weapons is irrelevant to the question of whether or not Ukraine should use them.
I think there are strong ethical arguments against supplying Ukraine with cluster munitions and I don’t think there are tactical or strategic considerations which outweigh those concerns. Ukraine has gotten almost all the kit it has asked for from the West to the point that there seems to be a growing frustration with Ukraine’s lack of gratitude for the help it has gotten. Still, all that kit wasn’t enough to prevent its summer counter-offensive from being a massive let down. Unlike in Kharkov the Russians are really trying to defend the areas it holds and seemingly no amount of Western training or gear has made it easy for Ukraine to push the Russians back. At some point both the West and Ukraine has to ask which sacrifices are too great even in the face of Putin’s armies. Maybe it would be worth dozens of civilians dying from unexploded submunitions in Ukraine in ten years if the invaders were driven out. That’s not my sacrifice to make. But that same sacrifice appears mightily pointless if it fails to drive out the invaders.
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I've always been interested in politics, economics, and the interplay between. The blog is a place for me to explore different ideas and concepts relating to economics or politics, be that national or international. The goal for the blog is to make you think; to provide new perspectives.
Written by Karl Johansson
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Cover photo by Алесь Усцінаў from Pexels, edited by Karl Johansson
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