https://sputnikglobe.com/20230713/hes-screwed-biden-official-tells-hersh-cluster-bombs-have-zero-chance-of-helping-ukraine-1111856918.html
‘He’s Screwed’: Biden Official Tells Hersh ‘Cluster Bombs Have Zero Chance’ of Helping Ukraine
‘He’s Screwed’: Biden Official Tells Hersh ‘Cluster Bombs Have Zero Chance’ of Helping Ukraine
Sputnik International
In a new article on the political sausage-making inside Biden’s foreign policy apparatus, Seymour Hersh said the administration was frankly aware of the futility and desperation behind its supplying cluster munitions to Ukraine.
2023-07-13T17:06+0000
2023-07-13T17:06+0000
2023-07-13T17:06+0000
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seymour hersh
ukraine
cluster bombs
joe biden
ukrainian crisis
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In a new article on the political sausage-making inside US President Joe Biden’s foreign policy apparatus, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh said the administration was frankly aware of the futility and desperation behind its supplying cluster munitions to Ukraine.In addition to noting that Biden’s decision, long postponed, has drawn considerable resistance both internationally and inside his own Democratic Party, Hersh pointed out that the US military admits it’s likely that between 5% and 14% of the bomblets won’t explode due to their age. Since they have no self-destruct device, unexploded bomblets will effectively become landmines and pose a danger to the civilian population long after the conclusion of the present conflict.“We didn’t give Ukraine cluster bombs earlier in the war, but we’re giving them cluster bombs now because that’s all we got left in the cupboard. Aren’t these the bombs that are banned all over the world because they kill kids? But the Ukrainians tell us they are not planning to drop them on civilians. And then the administration claims that the Russians have used them first in the war, which is just a lie,” the official told him.Hersh said the biggest concern is that soon, Ukraine’s counteroffensive will totally exhaust itself and Russia will launch an inevitable counter-strike later this summer.The Russian government has sharply denounced the US arming Ukraine with such weapons, with Moscow’s envoy in Washington, Anatoly Antonov, saying that “the current level of American provocations is really off scale, bringing humanity closer to a new world war."In Laos, more than one-third of the country’s farmland remains unusable half a century after the war ended, because it remains contaminated by unexploded US cluster bomblets. In 2016, then-US President Barack Obama said he regretted the bombing campaign and pledged $90 million to help Vientiane clear out the bomblets, but he stopped short of offering an apology.Cluster munitions have also been used in numerous other conflicts, including in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Western Sahara, and Yugoslavia.
https://sputnikglobe.com/20230711/why-team-biden-is-shrugging-off-moral-concerns-and-nato-divisions-over-cluster-bombs-1111817163.html
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cluster munitions; ukraine; seymour hersh: ukrainian crisis; conflict in ukraine; war in ukraine; cluster bomb for ukraine
cluster munitions; ukraine; seymour hersh: ukrainian crisis; conflict in ukraine; war in ukraine; cluster bomb for ukraine
‘He’s Screwed’: Biden Official Tells Hersh ‘Cluster Bombs Have Zero Chance’ of Helping Ukraine
Last week, the Biden administration announced it was sending 155-millimeter artillery shells containing cluster munitions to Ukraine, which then revealed it had already been supplied with the anti-personnel weapons. The devices are banned from war by international treaty, of which Washington and Kiev are two of the few holdouts from signing.
In
a new article on the political sausage-making inside US President Joe Biden’s foreign policy apparatus, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh said the administration was frankly aware of the futility and desperation behind its supplying cluster munitions to Ukraine.
In addition to noting that Biden’s decision, long postponed, has drawn considerable resistance
both internationally and inside
his own Democratic Party, Hersh pointed out that the US military admits it’s likely that between 5% and 14% of the bomblets won’t explode due to their age. Since they have no self-destruct device, unexploded bomblets will effectively become landmines and pose a danger to the civilian population long after the conclusion of the present conflict.
“Biden’s principal issue in the war is that he’s screwed,” an anonymous Biden administration official told Hersh.
“We didn’t give Ukraine cluster bombs earlier in the war, but we’re giving them cluster bombs now because that’s all we got left in the cupboard. Aren’t these the bombs that are banned all over the world because they kill kids? But the Ukrainians tell us they are not
planning to drop them on civilians. And then the administration claims that the Russians have used them first in the war, which is just a lie,” the official told him.
“In any case,” the official continued, “cluster bombs have zero chance of changing the course of the war.”
Hersh said the biggest concern is that soon,
Ukraine’s counteroffensive will totally exhaust itself and Russia will launch an inevitable counter-strike later this summer.
“What happens then?” the official asked Hersh. “The US has painted itself in a corner by calling for NATO to do something. Will NATO respond by sending the brigades now training in Poland and Romania on an airborne assault? We knew more about the German army in Normandy in World War II than we know about the Russian army in Ukraine.”
The Russian government has sharply denounced the US arming Ukraine with such weapons, with Moscow’s envoy in Washington, Anatoly Antonov, saying that “the current level of American provocations is really off scale, bringing humanity closer to a new world war."
Cluster bombs were first developed by Nazi Germany during World War II, although all major powers in the war developed their own similar devices. They became notorious during and after the US war in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, where enormous numbers of cluster bombs were used against communist forces.
In Laos, more than one-third of the country’s farmland remains unusable half a century after the war ended, because it remains contaminated by unexploded US cluster bomblets. In 2016, then-US President Barack Obama said he regretted the bombing campaign and pledged $90 million to help Vientiane clear out the bomblets, but he stopped short of offering an apology.
Cluster munitions have also been used in numerous other conflicts, including in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Western Sahara, and Yugoslavia.
