Killer Machines – Cluster Bombs: Supporting Matters to the Dublin Ban
by This work discusses the vexed issue of banning entire weapons systems from national military inventories, and the inherent problems with doing so.
Much of the recent analysis of cluster bomb (CB) deployment has, perhaps inevitably, concentrated on effect rather than the ostensible legality – or otherwise – of these weapons. Opponents of weapons that exact gratuitous death and injury on non-combatants will undoubtedly use emotive language to galvanise public opinion against these devices. In much the same way that the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) proselytised global opinion against AP landmines, the same tactics are again in evidence for a campaign against this apparent ‘new’ menace. The essential difference between Anti-Personnel Mines (APM) and CB weapons at this point in time lies within the legal sphere; the former are illegal and ratified as such in 144 countries, with 152 signatory states as at December, 2004. The latter, however, have thus far escaped proscription due to legal technicalities, which will be discussed later in this paper.
In the interim, the text will depart to discuss the possible implications of what continued use of these weapons will mean for the future of the Ottawa Treaty (the 1997 landmines Treaty), after a short discussion of the utility of this landmark legal document. After examining the legal position, the paper will discuss the issues of CB weapons in greater detail, but with the question of international law set against arms control measures always in mind. Firstly, we will introduce the subject of the mine ban as an instrument of arms control, using global consensus underpinned by normative approaches to arms proscription.
In the beginning …
December, 1997 ushered in what was considered at the time to be a ‘new’ era in conventional arms control. The ICBL had successfully overturned received wisdom about challenging state-centric, top-down security mechanisms, with Nobel co-Laureate Jody Williams proclaiming that civil society (and by inference grass-roots activism) was the ‘world’s new superpower.’ This claim was, unsurprisingly, supported by the fact that Ottawa concluded ‘the most expeditious arms control treaty in history. As a euphoric and landmark event, Ottawa built on its initial successes by its Entry into Force in March, 1999, following the 40th ratification by Burkina Faso six months earlier.
Be that as it may, the efficacy of Ottawa as arms control instrument is now almost a decade old, and of course subject to evolutionary scrutiny. As many an expert observer has noted, the binding nature of this event is about withstanding the global forces that exist in an anarchic global polity, and that the myth of legal inviolability has been exploded (sic) by the recidivist attitude of State signatory Angola, that went back to using mines again despite a solemn pledge not to do so. In short, the problem here is about enforcement; and, also, about the amoral and seemingly cynical attitude that gives succour to alleged ‘pariah’ states that have remained outside Ottawa’s orbit from the outset. Moreover, and to firmly contextualise the problems of whether Ottawa is worth the paper it is written on, El Salvador’s Vice Minister of External Affairs, Sr Rene Dominguez proudly stated for the record that his country is ‘totally mine free’ when in fact the International Demining Group (IDG), a humanitarian mine clearance foundation discovered 53 new minefields since the group commenced survey operations in 1998. What this shows is that legality in the international arena may reside only in the mind of those who contemplate such matters; however, this paper will seek to expand on the notion of law as it applies to CB weapon systems.
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