In Lviv, UNESCO is criticized for “not daring” to declare that it was Russia that carried out an attack on the World Heritage area

On the day the US announced that it would provide Ukraine with cluster munitions, experts are divided on how these American weapons can help Ukraine in its current counteroffensive, and whether they will leave behind a danger for years to come.

Experts emphasize that the Ukrainian government is currently faced with a difficult choice between saving the lives of the military now during a counteroffensive and risking the lives of civilians after the war.

Cluster bombs are “terrible”, but they are indispensable if the army does not have air support – experts

International security policy experts emphasize that Ukrainian forces can currently use only the weapons that are offered to them – cluster munitions could be replaced by fighter jets and helicopters, but they are not offered yet.

“If you are against sending cluster munitions to Ukraine, then I hope you are in favor of sending fighter jets and helicopters immediately. Otherwise, you are supporting the continuation of Russia’s brutal treatment and killing of Ukrainian civilians, making it difficult for Ukrainian troops to advance on Russian trenches,” explains the British political scientist Benjamin Tallis.

“To be clear, cluster munitions are nasty things with terrible potential long-term side effects. But they exist for a reason, specifically to clear trenches and entrenchments of enemy soldiers. War is terrible and leaves no good choice, but Ukraine needs cluster bombs.” – British expert Tallis, who currently works at the German Council on International Relations, a non-governmental research institution, explains in a series of tweets.

In a conversation with Voice of America correspondent Andriy Hetman, an expert at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA) Federico Borsari Leonardo says that Ukraine has long been asking the US for cluster munitions, which it needs to launch a counteroffensive. Because in fact it has not even started yet, the expert believes.

“In order to launch a counteroffensive, you need to know a clear path to move forward with offensive units, a clear path, open spaces that you can cross. And now the Ukrainians can’t do that because of minefields, through trenches, anti-tank ditches. So what Ukraine is doing now is preparing the ground for a counteroffensive, trying to open gaps in this defense,” the expert explains.

The use of cluster munitions makes it possible for the Ukrainians, who have to conduct a counteroffensive without air support, to feel the weak points of the enemy, he says. He emphasizes that “no NATO country has ever been involved in this kind of operations.”

In an interview with the CNN TV channel, a retired major of the US Army Mike Lyons says that Ukrainian troops now need cluster weapons in order to increase the effect of artillery strikes on Russian military targets. The ultimate goal, according to him, is to knock out the Russian military from the fortifications, preserving the lives of Ukrainians as much as possible.

“Russia is firing them at civilians. The Ukrainians (will fire) at military targets of the Russian forces. And what they will ultimately do is also save the lives of the Ukrainian crew. Every artillery shell has a return address, the Russian counter-battery is very good. This will allow our Ukrainian artillery to move quickly, shoot, communicate and get out of there,” explains the American military expert.

According to him, the Biden administration is “result-oriented” and does not want to send too much equipment to the front because, potentially, Ukraine could lose it if the Armed Forces begin to retreat. Therefore, cluster bombs can help at this stage to find weak points in the Russian defense and break through it there.

“The goal is to find the Russian troops where they are, explore the initial defenses, fire artillery, save Ukrainian lives, and then still find the weak point where it should be. This is not a classic counteroffensive, not a blitzkrieg. None there’s no breakthrough. We also need to make sure that Ukrainian forces don’t build up, they don’t stall, they don’t run out of ammunition. So that will be a plus for their weapons stockpile and allow them to continue the counteroffensive.”

As for the potential danger to civilians, according to the former US military, the Ukrainian government understands that they are fighting on their territory, they will know where these weapons were used and will resolve this issue after the war.

The American military says that Ukrainians are now fighting for survival, so they believe that issues that can be resolved in the future should be postponed in order to solve the main task – the preservation of the army and the state.

Human rights activists are stunned by the news

The Cluster Munitions Coalition (CMC) said on Friday (July 7th) that it is “appalled” by the United States’ plans to transfer banned cluster munitions to Ukraine as reported in the media. The organization’s statement says that these weapons have been repeatedly requested by the Ukrainian authorities, which are looking for opportunities to resist the Russian invasion.

“The Biden administration’s decision to transfer cluster munitions will contribute to the horrific casualties of Ukrainian civilians both now and for years to come. The use of cluster munitions by Russia and Ukraine exacerbates Ukraine’s already massive contamination with explosive remnants and landmines,” said Paul Gannon, Vice President chairman of the governing board of the coalition of the International Campaign to Ban Anti-Personnel Mines and Cluster Munitions.

The coalition recalls that since the beginning of its invasion of Ukraine in February, Russia has widely used cluster munitions, causing damage to the civilian population, civilian infrastructure and agriculture.

According to the United Nations, Human Rights Watch and other reports, Ukrainian forces used cluster munitions several times during the war, the coalition reminds.

The New York Times reports that between the mid-1940s and the present, cluster munitions have killed between 56,500 and 86,500 civilians in Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan, Lebanon, the Balkans, and Laos, where civilians are affected by cluster bombs. including children, many years after the conflict.

Human Rights Watch believes the cluster munitions the United States plans to send to Ukraine are old, meaning they are more than 20 years old, and have a “high failure rate,” meaning many of them do not explode immediately and remain on the ground until contact with a person for years. Their use in US military operations in 1991 and 2003 in Iraq led to casualties among the civilian population and US military personnel, HRW reminds.

Because of these risks, more than 100 countries of the world have abandoned the use of cluster weapons, but neither the USA, nor Ukraine and Russia, were among the countries that signed the international agreement on the abandonment of these weapons.

According to the SMS statement, states parties to the Convention on Cluster Munitions should oppose any transfer and use of weapons and call on Russia and Ukraine not to use cluster munitions because of the potential harm to the civilian population.

Pentagon denies rumors of obsolete ammunition

The Pentagon denies the information that the USA can send to Ukraine old and highly dangerous weapons for civilians. As the Voice of America reported, the press secretary of the Pentagon Pat Ryder stated at a briefing on July 6 that it is planned to send newer ammunition to Ukraine, which has a significantly lower failure rate than the old ones.

“We have various variants of cluster munitions (DPICMs, dual-purpose improved conventional munition – original) and those we are considering for transfer do not include older variants with a failure rate higher than 2.35%,” the Pentagon spokesman noted and added , that these data are confirmed by recent testing.

According to the Pentagon, cluster munitions will be useful for Ukraine, “especially against entrenched Russian positions on the battlefield.”

Ukrainian authorities also believe that the weapon will aid in its counteroffensive against Russian forces, allowing its forces to effectively engage Russian entrenched positions and overcome the disparity in manpower and artillery that exists between the advancing Ukrainian army and the superior Russian forces, who have had enough time to to gain a foothold and build defense lines on the captured Ukrainian territory.