the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
Aug 5, 2024
The U.S. has now transferred its fourth shipment of cluster bombs through its Miesau munitions depot in Germany to Ukraine for the Ukrainian army to use. These bombs were outlawed by 124 countries because they break up into many, many smaller bombs which explode in the air over a very wide area, with many pieces falling to the ground only to explode months or years later when disturbed. Most of the victims are civilian children.
There are still 80 million live bomblets in Laos, half a century after the U.S. stopped bombing there. The U.S. stopped producing them in 2016 but kept its stockpile for uses like now in Ukraine, exactly because they are so lethal to combatants.
Meanwhile, Germany agreed in 2009 to stop using them and spent tens of millions of dollars to destroy its stockpile. “The danger that cluster munitions pose to civilian populations can only be eliminated if the ban on these munitions is comprehensive,” Germany’s president declared at the time.
But last July the U.S. demanded to transfer cluster bombs through its massive, three-square-mile base in Miesau, staffed by hundreds of workers. The German president caved in, saying, “We cannot, in the current situation, block the United States.”
Many Ukrainians will suffer for decades to come. The U.S. military doesn’t care about the population of Ukraine—or the population of Germany, for that matter.