US media reported earlier this week that cluster bombs would be part of a new $800 million military aid package for Ukraine being prepared by the Biden administration.
The Pentagon and the White House have formally signed off on the delivery of cluster munitions to Kiev, ending months of speculation and debate about the deployment of the controversial weapons in the Eastern European country as part of NATO's ongoing proxy war against Russia.
"Today, the Department of Defense announced additional security assistance to meet Ukraine's critical security and defense needs. This package will provide Ukraine with additional artillery systems and ammunition, including highly effective and reliable dual-purpose improved conventional munitions (DPICM), on which the administration conducted extensive consultations with Congress and our allies and partners," the Pentagon said in a statement Friday, using another term for cluster bombs.
"We recognize that cluster munitions create a risk of civilian harm from unexploded ordnance," White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters in a briefing Friday.
"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. That is intolerable to us," Sullivan said.
Sullivan said the president's national security team had approved the delivery of cluster munitions to Ukraine "unanimously," and that US President Joe Biden "ultimately decided, in consultation with allies and partners and in consultation with members of Congress to move forward on this step."
In addition to cluster munitions, the new arms package will include 32 Bradley and 32 Stryker armored vehicles, Patriot air defense systems, AIM-7 missiles and Stingers from the Pentagon's stocks.
Sullivan assured the delivery of cluster bombs to Kiev does not constitute arming Ukraine to attack Russian territory.
"The United States is not going to war with Russia in Ukraine, and second, the United States is not providing weapons to Ukraine to attack Russia. We do not encourage or enable attacks on Russian territory from Ukraine," the official said.
Sullivan detailed that cluster bombs sent to Kiev would have a dud rate "not higher than 2.5%."
US Under Secretary of Defense Colin Kahl told reporters that Kiev has offered Washington written assurances it "will not use the rounds in civilian-populated urban environments, and that they will record where they use these rounds, which will simplify later demining efforts."
Kahl further indicated the US intends to deliver cluster munitions to Ukraine "in a timeframe that is relevant for" Ukraine's stalled counteroffensive, highlighting the matter's urgency in the Pentagon's eyes.
'Alarming' Escalation
Grigory Karasin, the head of the foreign affairs committee in the Russian Senate, warned that the delivery of cluster munitions to Kiev marks another major escalation of the Ukrainian crisis.
"This is a new step toward the escalation of the situation around Ukraine, to which Russia's response will be very tough," Karasin told Sputnik. "I hope that the international community will appreciate the situation, which is becoming more and more alarming and raises serious concerns about where things are headed thanks to the unilateral decisions by Washington and NATO which are incomprehensible" from the standpoint of "absolute common sense," the senior lawmaker added.
Crimean Senator Sergei Tsekov told Sputnik the indiscriminate use of cluster munitions by Ukraine would threaten widespread casualties among civilians.
Highly Lethal Terror Weapon
Cluster bombs are an extremely lethal weapon containing dozens or hundreds of explosive submunitions, or bomblets, and are designed to maximize damage to enemy forces across an area up to several hundred square meters.
Media first reported on Kiev's intention to lobby to receive US-made MK-20 cluster munitions in March.
Cluster munitions were banned by over 100 countries, but Ukraine and the US are not parties to the Cluster Munitions Convention (Russia, China, India, Brazil and much of NATO's eastern flank are also not members).
The US has used cluster munitions extensively in its military operations stretching back nearly six decades, dropping hundreds of millions of devices on Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, during the 1991 Gulf War, in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Iraq.
Russian UN envoy Vassily Nebenzia warned this week that the supply of cluster munitions to Ukraine would constitute "another step toward escalating" the Ukrainian crisis.
Military experts and human rights groups have expressed fears about Ukrainian forces using US-provided cluster bombs to terror bomb civilians in the Donbass and elsewhere, as they have already done using other NATO-provided weapons, such as long-range 155 mm artillery systems, HIMARS rockets, and missiles, on tens of thousands of occasions over the past year and a half.
In May, the Joint Center for Control and Coordination watchdog calculated that Ukrainian shelling in the Donbass had killed some 4,527 civilians and injured 4,431 others between February 2022 and May 10, 2023, with more than 100 of the fatalities caused by Ukraine's indiscriminate use of air-dropped scatterable anti-personnel landmines in civilian areas.
The decision by the United States to deliver cluster munitions to Ukraine is a provocation that is pushing humankind closer to a new world war, Russian Ambassador in Washington Anatoly Antonov said on Friday.
"With tenacity worthy of a better use, Washington continues to ‘raise the stakes’ in the conflict," Antonov said in a statement.
"No one doubted the deep involvement of the United States in the confrontation in Ukraine even without cluster munitions. However, the current level of American provocations is really off scale, bringing humanity closer to a new world war."
Antonov emphasized that the United States is so obsessed with the idea of defeating Russia that it does not realize the severity of its actions, which only lead to an increase in the number of victims and prolong the Kiev regime’s agony.
"The cruelty and cynicism with which Washington approached the issue of transferring deadly weapons to Kiev is striking," Antonov said.
"The [Biden] administration completely ignored the theses about the inhumanity of such a step, voiced by experts, human rights activists and legislators, turning a blind eye to civilian casualties. Now, through the fault of the United States, for many years there will be a risk that innocent civilians will be blown up by non-functioning submunitions."
Antonov went on to blast the decision as a gesture of desperation by Washington as it chose to openly ignore objections posed by its allies.
"Cluster munitions are a gesture of desperation," Antonov said.
"Such a measure speaks of the recognition by the United States and its satellites of their impotence. However, here they do not want to admit their own failures and the failure of the attempts of the Armed Forces of Ukraine to carry out an offensive against the Russian regions. Therefore, they commit new madness."
"Washington ignored the negative voice of its allies regarding the dangerous use of indiscriminate cluster munitions," Antonov said.
"This is despite the fact that among the members of the North Atlantic Alliance, there are many states that participate in the well-known Convention on Cluster Munitions. The UN Secretary-General's concerns also meant nothing to the administration."
Echoing Antonov's viewpoint, similar remarks were also made by Konstantin Kosachev, who serves as the deputy speaker of the Russian upper house. The Russian lawmaker noted that the US' decision effectively confirms Washington's readiness to kill civilians for the sake of continuing hostilities.
"In fact, the United States confirmed Kiev's inability to achieve anything without the use of the most condemned weapons, confirmed readiness to kill civilians for the sake of continuing hostilities at any cost and assumed full responsibility for all future victims of this monstrous weapon," Kosachev said on Telegram.
The commentary comes moments after the US unveiled a new military assistance package for Ukraine that includes cluster munitions, a controversial weapon banned in dozens of countries and long seen as a danger to non-combatants.
Often times, the munitions fail to ignite upon deployment and more times than not detonated by civilian activity years after hostilities in affected areas come to a close. In fact, the International Committee of the Red Cross has reported that such arms have a 10-40% fail rate.
Shortly after the munitions announcement was made, US President Joe Biden in an interview with US media claimed the move was a "very difficult decision," but that he did so at the recommendation of the Pentagon as "this is a war relating to munitions."
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova posted a video after the US decision to supply Ukraine with cluster munitions, in which the former White House press secretary calls the use of such projectiles a war crime.
The video shows Psaki's speech on February 28, 2022, saying that " the use of cluster munitions is a war crime."
"A year and a half later, US President Biden's national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, announced at a briefing at the White House that he intended to transfer cluster munitions to Ukraine. We are waiting for the release of Biden's press secretary Karin Jean-Pierre, " Zakharova said.
No comments:
Post a Comment