The decision was made despite widespread fears that these bombs could cause civilian casualties. The Pentagon says it will send bombs with a reduced failure rate, meaning they will have fewer munitions that don’t explode first and cause civilian deaths later.
Cluster bombs, long requested by Ukraine, open in midair, releasing submunitions that are dispersed over a large area to destroy multiple targets simultaneously.
The sources spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the move before the official announcement.
The Ukrainians have requested these weapons to try to break through the Russian lines and advance their counteroffensive. Russian forces already use cluster bombs on the battlefield and in populated civilian areas, according to US officials.
According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, some cluster munitions leave a large number of unexploded submunitions, up to 40% of them in some cases. US officials have said the unexploded ordnance rate of weapons going to Ukraine is less than 3% and will therefore pose less danger to civilians.
Brigadier General Pat Ryder told a Pentagon news conference Thursday that he had no announcement on cluster munitions. He noted that the Department of Defense has “multiple variants” of the munitions and that “the ones we are considering providing would not include older variants with rates greater than 2.35%” of unexploded ordnance.
Ryder did not say whether Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has contacted NATO counterparts to address some of their concerns about the use of cluster munitions. Ryder said the United States is aware of reports that some munitions have higher non-detonation rates.
Should a decision be made to send the munitions to Ukraine, he noted that the United States would “carefully choose the rounds with the lowest non-detonation rates, for which we have recent test data.”
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Associated Press writers Matthew Lee and Tara Copp contributed to this report.
FUENTE: Associated Press
