The Horror Of Cluster Bombs.....
It wasn't until I saw a report on last night's tv news, that I had any awareness of cluster bombs and the horror that they bring to human lives.
This particularly unpleasant piece of military hardware falls haphazardly from planes overhead, scatters into hundreds of smaller 'bomblets', before hitting the ground and each exploding into thousands of tiny shards of high velocity, white hot chunks of metal.
The fact that these explosive pieces of shrapnel can fly through flesh and bone indiscriminately, causing injury and death to all around them is in-human enough.
But it gets worse. These little beauties have a 40% 'fail rate'. So once they've been dropped, 40% of them just sit on the ground, waiting to flay the flesh from anyone who happens to pass by at any moment, or who might accidently disturb them. More often than not, this will be civilians. In farming and rural communities, it is particularly dangerous, as the bomblets sit among crops, just waiting to deliver their deadly message, long after the original, (supposed) target has moved on. This side effect is well known and documented in military circles.
Knowing this, Israel dropped thousands of these little bastards on Lebanon during the recent 'conflict'. And 90% of the ones they dropped were dropped in the last 72 hours of the conflict. When cessation of hostilities was well under way.
The UN currently has over 100 mine clearing experts working the area. There are reports of at least one child having set one off already this week. Many farmers are unable to harvest crops whilst clearing takes place.
Could Israel do any more to earn the reputation as one of the nastiest bunches of bastards on the planet?
This particularly unpleasant piece of military hardware falls haphazardly from planes overhead, scatters into hundreds of smaller 'bomblets', before hitting the ground and each exploding into thousands of tiny shards of high velocity, white hot chunks of metal.
The fact that these explosive pieces of shrapnel can fly through flesh and bone indiscriminately, causing injury and death to all around them is in-human enough.
But it gets worse. These little beauties have a 40% 'fail rate'. So once they've been dropped, 40% of them just sit on the ground, waiting to flay the flesh from anyone who happens to pass by at any moment, or who might accidently disturb them. More often than not, this will be civilians. In farming and rural communities, it is particularly dangerous, as the bomblets sit among crops, just waiting to deliver their deadly message, long after the original, (supposed) target has moved on. This side effect is well known and documented in military circles.
Knowing this, Israel dropped thousands of these little bastards on Lebanon during the recent 'conflict'. And 90% of the ones they dropped were dropped in the last 72 hours of the conflict. When cessation of hostilities was well under way.
The UN currently has over 100 mine clearing experts working the area. There are reports of at least one child having set one off already this week. Many farmers are unable to harvest crops whilst clearing takes place.
Could Israel do any more to earn the reputation as one of the nastiest bunches of bastards on the planet?
posted by Stevie at 8:08 am
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