The US administration said that it had received ‘written assurances’ from Ukraine that it would use cluster bombs carefully. Nonetheless, the munition will provide an additional risk to civilians.
given how they’re practically used it’s not particularly likely that cluster munitions are going to disproportionately harm Russians―essentially by design (and not dissimilar to the mining Russia is doing in parts of Ukraine), cluster munitions can’t and don’t work like that―so i think if you lean on that to justify this that’s a pretty weak justification.
i don’t think Ukraine should carte blanche do things i would consider bad and harmful just because they’re unambiguously the good guys. cluster munitions have clear drawbacks and are clearly harmful to people who aren’t Russians and aren’t combatants when used, and i don’t think countries should kill civilians and people who haven’t done anything wrong just because it maybe potentially will slightly expedite a war that’s now been going on for almost ten years. that’s a good way to end up concluding war crimes are justified because they’re happening to the “wrong” people.
I think there is a similar moral calculus here to that in WWII with decisions to bomb urban areas. Once you have been attacked and find yourself in an existential struggle, use of weapons becomes a question of the scope of innocent life lost versus the likelihood that lives will be saved.
In this case I think it is understandable that people are uneasy about the use of cluster munitions. The risks are well known but the benefits here seem … less so. That take may be wrong, but the point is that people have a right to feel queasy about the situation.
Not sure WWII is the best model for moral calculus: invade Japan killing 500,000 to 1 million soldiers, or nuke 2 cities killing only 50,000… oops, over 200,000 innocent civilians.
I think it’s been a long time since there’s been a real winner in any war. All wars for several centuries already, seem to have been a lose-lose scenario except for some well positioned elites.
Usually when an argument proceeds from crossing out what someone actually said and replacing it with what they did not say, it is going to be a staggeringly bad take.
given how they’re practically used it’s not particularly likely that cluster munitions are going to disproportionately harm Russians
Yeah, russian soldiers. Ukraine has shown the utmost constraint when it comes to attacks on russian civilians. russia, on the other hand, has not. In fact, it has done the exact opposite - intentionally attacking civilian or Geneva convention protected targets instead of military ones.
And no, seeing how cluster ammunition is practically used, russian civilians are not going to disproportionately harmed. It’s going to be military targets which will be fucked up.
It’s going to be military targets which will be fucked up.
unless you have data i don’t, the article seems to pretty definitively refute this point. overwhelmingly the people impacted by cluster munition use are civilians (97% of casualties were civilians in 2021) both in and outside of Ukraine, and their usage has a very long tail of fatalities.[1] there is no reason to think that even if they’re tailored specifically to nebulous military use against Russian soldiers that won’t also be the outcome here, because it is literally everywhere else they get used.
Vietnam and Cambodia are the poster children for this: the countries still have have dozens of civilian fatalities a year from cluster bombing ordinance, and it’s been 48 years since the Vietnam War ended. ↩︎
• Preliminary data indicates at least 689 civilian casualties during cluster munition attacks in Ukraine during the first half of 2022.
So to summarize:
Nearly every cluster bomb being used worldwide is being used by Russians in Ukraine
Nearly every cluster bomb casualty is a civilian
Considering that Russia has an extremely well-documented history of specifically targeting civilians, regardless of munitions type, this seems like more of a Russia problem than a cluster bomb problem (at least to the point that it renders these specific statistics moot in a discussion about the general risks of cluster munitions, when used by militaries that are not as barbarous and murderous as the Russian military)
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given how they’re practically used it’s not particularly likely that cluster munitions are going to disproportionately harm Russians―essentially by design (and not dissimilar to the mining Russia is doing in parts of Ukraine), cluster munitions can’t and don’t work like that―so i think if you lean on that to justify this that’s a pretty weak justification.
How about you let Ukrainians decide how best to defend their homes?
i don’t think Ukraine should carte blanche do things i would consider bad and harmful just because they’re unambiguously the good guys. cluster munitions have clear drawbacks and are clearly harmful to people who aren’t Russians and aren’t combatants when used, and i don’t think countries should kill civilians and people who haven’t done anything wrong just because it maybe potentially will slightly expedite a war that’s now been going on for almost ten years. that’s a good way to end up concluding war crimes are justified because they’re happening to the “wrong” people.
I think there is a similar moral calculus here to that in WWII with decisions to bomb urban areas. Once you have been attacked and find yourself in an existential struggle, use of weapons becomes a question of the scope of innocent life lost versus the likelihood that lives will be saved.
In this case I think it is understandable that people are uneasy about the use of cluster munitions. The risks are well known but the benefits here seem … less so. That take may be wrong, but the point is that people have a right to feel queasy about the situation.
Not sure WWII is the best model for moral calculus: invade Japan killing 500,000 to 1 million soldiers, or nuke 2 cities killing only
50,000… oops, over 200,000 innocent civilians.I think it’s been a long time since there’s been a real winner in any war. All wars for several centuries already, seem to have been a lose-lose scenario except for some well positioned elites.
How about you let
Ukrainiansthe Ukrainian bourgeoisie decide how best to defend theirhomesproperty and class interests?Usually when an argument proceeds from crossing out what someone actually said and replacing it with what they did not say, it is going to be a staggeringly bad take.
LOL a tankie
Yeah, russian soldiers. Ukraine has shown the utmost constraint when it comes to attacks on russian civilians. russia, on the other hand, has not. In fact, it has done the exact opposite - intentionally attacking civilian or Geneva convention protected targets instead of military ones.
And no, seeing how cluster ammunition is practically used, russian civilians are not going to disproportionately harmed. It’s going to be military targets which will be fucked up.
unless you have data i don’t, the article seems to pretty definitively refute this point. overwhelmingly the people impacted by cluster munition use are civilians (97% of casualties were civilians in 2021) both in and outside of Ukraine, and their usage has a very long tail of fatalities.[1] there is no reason to think that even if they’re tailored specifically to nebulous military use against Russian soldiers that won’t also be the outcome here, because it is literally everywhere else they get used.
Vietnam and Cambodia are the poster children for this: the countries still have have dozens of civilian fatalities a year from cluster bombing ordinance, and it’s been 48 years since the Vietnam War ended. ↩︎
From your linked pdf:
So to summarize:
Considering that Russia has an extremely well-documented history of specifically targeting civilians, regardless of munitions type, this seems like more of a Russia problem than a cluster bomb problem (at least to the point that it renders these specific statistics moot in a discussion about the general risks of cluster munitions, when used by militaries that are not as barbarous and murderous as the Russian military)