Cluster Bombs must be deemed Immoral

I am writing to express my personal indignation over the use of Cluster bombs by my government. If you don’t know about them. Cluster bombs (or cluster munitions) are weapons that work by dispersing several, in some cases hundreds, of smaller submunitions, often referred to as bomblets or grenades, over a wide area. Cluster bombs pose a grave danger to civilians in situations of conflict because of the indiscriminate way the weapons are designed to scatter explosives over wide swaths of land. They also endanger civilians long after a conflict is over because the high number of unexploded bomblets become de facto landmines.

Depending on the type of munition and the delivery system, one cluster bomb can strike an area as large 250 acres. Cluster munitions can be delivered from an aircraft, via bombs, or launched from land-based systems such as artillery, via rockets, artillery shells or missiles.

The U.S. currently produces, stockpiles, trades, and uses cluster bombs, and has thus far remained outside of all efforts to regulate the weapons under international humanitarian law. In my humble opinion the U.S. should heed the call of the growing number of organizations calling for a ban on the use of these unreliable, inaccurate, and inhumane weapons. Instead our government is calling for increasing nuclear proliferation.

In my humble opinion this is unconscionable!