37 years later, America is still killing innocent people in Laos

Bfgrn

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Apr 4, 2009
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If you haven't had a chance to see this documentary, it is a must. PBS runs it on occasion. The saddest part of the saga is children are the most vulnerable, because they are attracted to the 'bombies'.

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Cluster bombs are small explosive bomblets carried in a large cannister that opens in mid-air, scattering them over a wide area. The bomblets may be delivered by aircraft, rocket, or by artillery projectiles.

The CBU (cluster bomb unit) 26, which was widely used in Laos, is an anti-personnel fragmentation bomb that consists of a large bombshell holding 670 tennis ball-sized bomblets, each of which contain 300 metal fragments. If all the bomblets detonate, some 200,000 steel fragments will be propelled over an area the size of several football fields, creating a deadly killing zone.

The Consequences
Wherever they been used - Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, Sudan, Lebanon, Iraq, Kuwait, Yugoslavia, Kosovo, Ethiopia, Chechnya, and Afghanistan, unexploded cluster bombs have created problems for civilians:

* During the Gulf War over 30 million cluster bomblets were dropped on Kuwait and Iraq and, in the following months, unexploded bombs killed 1,600 civilians and injured another 2,500.

* According to a recent study by the Red Cross, children in Kosovo are five times more likely to be killed or injured by a NATO-dropped unexploded cluster bomb than by a Serbian landmine.

* Today, in Afghanistan, reports indicate that the U.S. use of cluster bombs is causing the same kinds of tragic consequences for civilians there as they did in other countries. Because cluster bombs are area weapons with a wide dispersal pattern, they kill living things indiscriminately, including civilians. And their high-failure rate means that the killing of innocent people will continue long after the bombs stop dropping.

Cluster Bombs Today
Their current use in Afghanistan is helping to focus the world's attention on cluster bombs. Many feel that their impact on civilians is unacceptable and a breach of international humanitarian law. More than 50 international organizations, including the International Committee of the Red Cross, the Mennonite Central Committee, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the International Committee to Ban Landmines have called for a moratorium on cluster bomb use. And, in spite of the fact that cluster bombs are one of the favorite and most deadly weapons in the U.S. and NATO arsenals, on December 13, 2001 the European Parliament passed a resolution calling for an immediate global moratorium on their use to be followed by an outright ban.

ITVS: Bombies

It is the job of thinking people not to be on the side of the executioners.
Albert Camus
 
Princess Di would have been pleased...
:cool:
US halts use of persistent mines
Wed, Feb 16, 2011 - The US military has stopped using a type of landmine often condemned as a long-term threat to civilians and has ordered its stock of 1.3 million of the mines be set aside for destruction, officials say.
The decision to move ahead with a long-standing policy to end the use of persistent landmines — those that cannot be set to self-destruct or deactivate — by the end of last year comes as US President Barack Obama’s administration continues to study whether to join a global treaty banning anti-personnel mines.

The US is not a party to the 12-year-old international Mine Ban Treaty and it reserves the right to use so-called smart mines that can deactivate or self-destruct. Persistent mines are criticized because they can pose a threat to civilians long after fighting ends. Landmines and other war debris caused about 4,000 casualties in 2009, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines says.

The US Army in December directed its field operations “to assign all stocks of persistent landmines, both anti-personnel and anti-vehicle, for demilitarization [destruction],” a US Department of Defense spokesman said in an e-mail on Monday. He said a small quantity of the persistent mines would be retained for demining and counter-mine testing and training.

Source
 
And the USA will still not sign on to ban land mines, Napalm, and cluster munition use on humans.

But don't say things like God damn America...you will be ostracized and belittled.
 

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