Weapons-1

U.S. opposition to cluster bomb ban fails

GENEVA - A U.S.-led push to regulate, rather than ban, cluster munitions failed on Nov. 25 after 50 countries objected, following humanitarian campaigners’ claims that anything less than an outright ban would be an unprecedented reversal of human rights law. While the United States, China and Russia want rules about the manufacture and use of cluster bombs, activists say such regulations would legitimize the munitions, backtracking from the Oslo Convention, an international treaty that seeks a worldwide ban.

Cluster bombs, dropped by air or fired by artillery, scatter hundreds of bomblets across a wide area and can kill and maim civilians long after conflicts end. Opponents want them banned because they are indiscriminate weapons, raining bomblets that may fail to explode on impact and lie dormant, ready to kill or injure anyone who picks them up or touches them by mistake.

Those lining up against the U.S. plan included the International Committee of the Red Cross and the top U.N. officials for human rights, emergency relief and development.

The U.N. agency chiefs said cluster bombs were a particular threat to children, who are attracted by their unusual, toy-like shapes and colors. They said they were extremely concerned at plans to do anything less than ban them.

– edited from Reuters, November 25, 2011
PeaceMeal, Nov/December 2011

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, articles in this publication are distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.)

U.S. expansion of drone use in targeted killings
raises serious moral and legal questions

Unmanned drone aircraft armed with missiles are playing a greater role than ever in U.S. counter-terrorism operations. Under President Obama, the number of drones and their use have escalated dramatically. In the administration’s new counter-terrorism strategy, large-scale combat brigades are being replaced by Special Forces strike teams, capture- and-interrogate operations, and targeted killings with drones.

Establishment of new bases for drone aircraft by the U.S. in the Horn of Africa and the Arabian Peninsula pose serious questions about overreach and accountability. Bases are being established or have been established in Ethiopia, the Seychelles and Djibouti. The “constellation” of bases is intended to allow targeting of Al Qaeda affiliates and other terrorists in Somalia and Yemen, new battlegrounds in the conflict with Islamic militants.

One worrisome aspect is the geographical reach of the new strategy. We’re at war in Afghanistan (a conflict that has spilled over into Pakistan), but do we also have the right to kill people we think may pose a threat in Somalia or Yemen? And if we can do it in Somalia and Yemen, can we also do it in London or Los Angeles? Would we think it was acceptable if Russia gunned down a Chechen terrorist on the streets of New York?

Granted, the battlefield in the war against terrorism transcends national borders, but surely there must be some limit? Instead, Congress is moving to expand the theater of operations. A defense bill approved in May by the House of Representatives authorizes force directed against “Al Qaeda, the Taliban, and associated forces,” but doesn’t include any geographical limitations whatsoever.

It is not only the military who are now using drones. The Central Intelligence Agency, in a program it does not publicly acknowledge, now operates Predator and Reaper drones armed with Hellfire missiles over at least five countries: Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen and Libya.

Analysts and former U.S. intelligence officials generally approve of the increasing reliance on drones, but warn they are not without drawbacks. Those include civilian casualties, resentment of the U.S. warfare-from-a-distance in Pakistan and elsewhere, and the likelihood the technology will spread and be turned against the United States in the future. Innocent bystanders have frequently been killed in drone strikes, but such deaths appear to have decreased in recent years.

Paul Pillar, a Georgetown University professor and former top CIA analyst, said drones are a “more effective and better focused way” of using military force against militants. “But,” he said, “we must bear in mind as we make each individual decision about a drone strike that the immediate positive results always have to be weighed against the potentially longer-term consequences, given how it’s perceived and possible resentment.”

The process by which the military and the CIA determine who belongs on a target list is also of concern. The United States should not be aiming its missiles at everyone who associates with Al Qaeda and similar groups, or at mere propagandists. Decisions about targeted killings should be reviewed at the highest levels of the administration and monitored closely by Congress.

But no one in the government is talking about the questions of the morality and legality of targeted assassinations. In a report to the United Nations Human Rights Council last year, the U.N. special representative on extrajudicial executions, Philip Alston, called on the United States to exercise greater restraint in its use of drones in places outside the war zones in Afghanistan and Iraq, places like Pakistan and Yemen. His report also said that a targeted killing outside of an armed conflict “is almost never likely to be legal.”

The CIA’s use of drones for covert black operations, which are conducted without any public accountability, are especially disturbing. CIA operatives have no legal right to participate in armed hostilities and are unlawful combatants. They do not wear uniforms, are not subject to the military chain of command, and may be charged with a crime for killing with drones.

In a statement accompanying his report, Mr. Alston said, “I’m particularly concerned that the United States ... asserts an ever-expanding entitlement for itself to target individuals across the globe. But this strongly asserted but ill-defined license to kill without accountability is not an entitlement which the United States or other states can have without doing grave damage to the rules designed to protect the right to life and prevent extrajudicial executions.”

The report also proposed a summit meeting of “key military powers” to clarify legal limits on such killings.

The Obama administration’s legal rationale was partly outlined in March by State Department legal adviser, Harold Koh. He claimed that the United States obeyed legal limits on the use of force when selecting targets, and he defended drone killings as lawful because of the armed conflict with Al Qaeda and because of the nation’s right to self-defense. But the self-serving statement seemed troublingly reminiscent of the Bush administration’s “legal” opinion justifying the use of torture.

– edited from Reuters, Los Angeles Times and The New York Times
PeaceMeal, Jan/February 2011

Weapons of Mideast oppression ‘Made in U.S.A.’

Patrick Connors

With our government’s support, U.S. companies have provided military and crowd-control equipment that has propped up authoritarian governments throughout the Middle East. Hence, rather than seeing the U.S. as spreading freedom, Arabs who have taken to the streets have experienced “Made in U.S.A.” tear gas used by repressive governments to kill and maim unarmed protesters and crush popular movements for justice.

For unarmed Arab protesters in Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen, Tunisia and the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Pennsylvania may seem to be the tear-gas capital of the world judging by the labels on the canisters fired at them. Combined Systems Inc. (CSI) is headquartered in Jamestown, Pa., NonLethal Technologies Inc.’s home is in Homer City, Pa. The defunct Federal Laboratories was in Saltsburg, Pa.

The recent wave of deaths and injuries from tear gas began in the West Bank. Jawaher Abu Rahmah died on Jan. 1 after she was overcome by tear gas the day before at a protest against Israel’s construction of its illegal wall and settlements on the farmland of the village of Bil’in. CSI tear-gas canisters littered the village. Jawaher’s brother, Bassem Abu Rahmah, was killed in 2009 in Bil’in when he was shot directly in the chest during a peaceful protest by an Israeli soldier with an extended-range CSI tear-gas canister.

In Tunisia, Lucas Mebrouk Dolega, a 32-year-old photographer from France, died on Jan. 17 after being hit by a tear-gas grenade fired at close range by Tunisian police. On Feb. 6, a Tunisian protester was killed when he was shot in the head with a tear-gas canister. CSI is a major tear-gas provider for Tunisia.

In Egypt, dozens of canisters made by [CSI subsidiary] Combined Tactical Systems were fired at crowds on one Cairo street. And Human Rights Watch staff reported seeing dead protesters in Alexandria with “massive head wounds from tear-gas canisters.”

In Bahrain and Yemen, according to news reports, peaceful protesters have been shot at with tear gas from CSI, NonLethal Technologies and Federal Laboratories.

The U.S. gives billions in military aid annually to these countries and the U.S. State Department approves the export and sale of tear gas to them by U.S. companies. The American-made tear gas is a symbol of U.S. policy in the Middle East that has supported repression and cheap oil at the expense of human rights.

Americans should follow the example of people in Britain and France and demand that the State Department stop approving the sale of tear gas and other weapons that are being used by repressive governments in the Middle East, including Israel, to deny basic freedoms and rights. Death, injury and the denial of basic human rights in the Middle East should no longer be “Made in the U.S.A.”

Patrick Connors is a member of Adalah-NY, a New York City- based group advocating for Palestinian rights and boycott of Israel. His article is edited from the Los Angeles Times, March 3, 2011 and was reprinted in PeaceMeal, March/April 2011..

The real ‘Merchants of Death’

The real “merchants of death” — those who provide the weapons with which people kill people — are not the relatively small-time, illegal gunrunners, but respectable developed countries and international corporations. The world’s 10 biggest arms exporters in order are the United States, Russia, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Spain, China, Israel, the Netherlands and Italy. In 2009, the global arms trade was a $57.5-billion business, of which the U.S.’s 39-percent share came to $22.6 billion.Most of the trade, $45.1 billion, focuses on developing nations. Of the top seven arms purchasers in 2008, four of them — India, Malaysia, Pakistan and Algeria — are countries that can ill afford to spend their meager resources on weaponry. Brazil, Venezuela, Egypt and Vietnam were also among the bigger arms buyers in 2009, and Iraq is planning to purchase $13 billion in U.S. weaponry. All are countries struggling with poverty.

The United States overwhelmingly dominates arms sales to the developing world. In 2008, it cornered 68 percent of such sales and 45 percent in 2009. The major U.S. corporations involved in the global arms trade are Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman and General Dynamics. The arms trade is an enormously profitable enterprise for the companies involved, and any effort to curb that trade brings on an assault of lobbyists and political action committees. Lockheed Martin, the world’s largest arms producer, spent over $20 million to lobby Congress in 2009.

The U.S. arms manufacturers have carefully spread their operations to scores of states, so that when an effort is made to cutback or eliminate certain weapons, local congress members will rise to defend jobs in their district. When a move was made to cut the B-2 stealth bomber — a Cold War leftover that cost $2 billion apiece, its manufacturer, Northrop Grumman, mobilized 383 congressional districts in 46 states to successfully save the plane. The B-2 requires more than 100 hours of maintenance for each hour of flight.

The result of lobbying efforts by the arms companies is not only continued spending, but also expensive weapons systems that don’t work or are simply unneeded. One example is Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, which has been in development for nine years and has not yet entered service. The United States intends to buy a total 2,443 of the aircraft for an estimated $323 billion, making it the most expensive defense program ever. 2010 budget data of the U.S. Air Force and other sources project the F-35 to have a unit flyaway cost that ranges between $89 million and $200 million, depending on which of three variants. U.S. aircraft designer Pierre Sprey has called the F-35 “heavy and sluggish.”To have a real impact on the global arms enterprise will require confronting powerful corporations, with their lobbies and their PACs, as well as an immense military establishment. But according to Frida Berrigan of the Arms and Security Project of the New American Foundation, the Obama Administration is “investigating” how to make the selling of military technology even easier.

A United Nations conference on drawing up a treaty to limit the global arms trade is set for 2012, although there have been no serious negotiations to date. Such a treaty will need to do more than get a handle on some of the more objectionable practices currently underway. It must restrict and then move toward an eventual ban on the trade itself.

– edited from an article by Conn Hallinan on www.portside.org
PeaceMeal, Jan/February 2011

Armed violence kills 2,000 a day worldwide

More than 2,000 people around the world are dying from armed violence each day, on average, according to groups supporting a treaty to regulate the international trade in small arms. A resolution setting out a timetable for talks during the next two years on such a proposed Arms Trade Treaty was adopted October 30, 2009, by the United Nations General Assembly, consisting of all 192 U.N. member governments. The vote on the resolution, which includes a U.N. conference to produce a final accord in 2012, was 153-1 with 19 abstentions. Zimbabwe cast the only vote against the resolution, while China, Russia, Iran, Syria, India, Pakistan and Cuba were among the nations that abstained.

A report by the 12 advocacy groups, written by British-based Oxfam, said that since October 2006, an estimated 2.1 million people died as a direct or indirect result of armed violence -- most of them civilians. That equates to more than 2,000 per day, or more than one every minute. Of the deaths, more than 700,000 resulted from armed conflicts, including those in Afghanistan, Somalia, Sudan, Sri Lanka and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the report said. The figures also include people killed in non-political violence involving firearms.

The Obama administration voted to support the resolution, reversing the stance of the Bush administration in October 2008, when Zimbabwe and the United States were the only nations to oppose a previous resolution. The proposed international treaty would regulate the sale of small arms and light weapons, which can fuel instability, transnational organized crime and terrorism. The U.S. is the largest conventional arms trader in the world, responsible for 40 percent of the $55 billion-a-year trade.

Supporters say the treaty would give worldwide coverage to close gaps in existing regional and national arms export control systems that allow weapons to pass onto the illicit market. Nations would remain in charge of their arms export control arrangements, but would legally be obliged to assess each export against criteria to be negotiated. Governments would have to authorize transfers in writing and in advance.

The following case reveals some of the methods that gun runners now use to acquire and deliver small arms and light weapons: In 2001, an Israeli arms dealer operating out of Panama duped the Nicaraguan government into selling him 3000 AK-47s and 2.5 million rounds of ammunition. The broker said that he was procuring the weapons on behalf of the Panamanian National Police, a claim ostensibly substantiated by a Panamanian end-user certificate. It was a lie. The end-user certificate was a forgery and the Panamanians had no knowledge of the deal. On November 2, 2001, the weapons were loaded into a Panamanian-registered ship that departed the next day from the Nicaraguan port of El Bluff. Two days later, it arrived in Colombia, where the actual recipients -- members of Colombia's vicious paramilitary groups -- were waiting to claim their prize.

The proposed Arms Trade Treaty is opposed by conservative U.S. think-tanks like the Heritage Foundation, which said that it would not restrict the access of "dictators and terrorists" to arms but would reduce the ability of democracies like Israel to defend their people. The National Rifle Association has also opposed the treaty.

Even without such opposition, the treaty already may have received a death blow. The resolution passed says the conference in 2012 will be conducted "on the basis of consensus," in which every nation has an effective veto on agreements. That may prevent the achievement of a meaningful treaty.

The vote on the Arms Trade Treaty resolution continues Obama administration moves to reverse the policies of President George W. Bush. Those actions have included joining the Geneva-based U.N. Human Rights Council and backing a General Assembly declaration urging the decriminalization of homosexuality.

– edited from Reuters, Bloomberg.com and Federation of American Scientists
PeaceMeal, May/June 2010

450 Mayors petition Obama to adopt broad gun reform

A new report from a national coalition of mayors urges President Obama to adopt dozens of reforms to help curb gun violence, including steps to crack down on problems at gun shows and the creation of a federal interstate firearms trafficking unit. The “Blueprint for Federal Action on Illegal Guns,” presents 40 recommendations that “would dramatically improve law enforcement’s ability to keep guns out of the hands of criminals — and, in doing so, save innocent lives.”

The strategies outlined by the Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a bipartisan group of about 450 mayors nationwide, focus on the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. According to the report, hard work by ATF field agents has “been undermined by congressional restrictions, inadequate resources, and a lack of leadership from federal officials in Washington.”

The proposed changes could be accomplished within existing laws through agency reforms, regulatory moves and better funding, the 51-page report said, and suggests a handful of strategies that would tighten ATF oversight of thousands of gun shows held annually. The study noted that a 2007 inspector general’s probe concluded the “ATF does not have a formal gun show enforcement program.” ATF agents should have greater discretion to conduct criminal investi-gations at gun shows identified as sources of firearms later seized in crimes, the report states, noting that “criminal activity endemic to some gun shows goes unchecked.”

The report also calls for a better approach to crime gun tracing, the process that tracks a seized weapon back to its first retail sale. The ATF lacks the structure or resources to “fully realize its power,” the report says, and information is not regularly shared with field offices and state and local law enforcement.

Because serial numbers are sometimes obliterated on crime guns, the study also wants ATF to require that manufacturers stamp new guns with a second, hidden serial number. Another recommendation calls for the FBI to notify local and state law enforcement every time a person attempts to buy a gun, but does not pass the background check. And federal prosecutors should more aggressively prosecute people who fail the background check, the study says. In 2005, the FBI referred 67,713 cases to the ATF, but federal prosecutors pursued only 135 of those cases.

Proposed changes urge that the ATF be given additional manpower. The agency has about 2,500 agents spread among 22 field divisions and lacks resources to effectively police gun trafficking across state and national borders. The ATF also needs $53 million to hire more field inspectors to ensure compliance by gun dealers. At the current pace, dealers are inspected once every 11 years instead of the agency’s goal of once every three years, according to the report.

“Implementing these recommendations would achieve a goal that all participants in the gun debate support: enforcing laws already on the books,” says an accompanying letter signed by the coalition's co-chairmen, Mayors Thomas M. Menino (D) of Boston and Michael R. Bloomberg (I) of New York.

– edited from The Washington Post, 3 October 2009
PeaceMeal, March/April 2010

U.N. investigator warns U.S. on use of drones

A U.N. human rights investigator warned the United States October 27 that its use of unmanned warplanes to carry out targeted executions may violate international law. Philip Alston said that unless the Obama administration explains the legal basis for targeting particular individuals and the measures it is taking to comply with international humanitarian law which prohibits arbitrary executions, “it will increasingly be perceived as carrying out indiscriminate killings in violation of international law.”

Alston, the U.N. Human Rights Council’s investigator on extra-judicial, summary and arbitrary executions, raised the issue of U.S. Predator drones in a report to the General Assembly’s human rights committee, saying he has become increasingly concerned at the dramatic increase in their use since June, especially in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Alston said the U.S. response — that the Geneva-based council and the General Assembly have no role in regard to killings during an armed conflict — “is simply untenable.”

“That would remove the great majority of issues that come before these bodies right now,” Alston said. “The onus is really on the government of the United States to reveal more about the ways in which it makes sure that arbitrary executions, extrajudicial executions are not, in fact, being carried out through the use of these weapons.”

Alston, a law professor at New York University, said that while there may be circumstances where the use of drones “to carry out targeted executions” is consistent with international law, this can only be determined in light of information on the legal basis for selecting certain individuals.

Alston said the U.S. should provide details on its use of drones, what precautions it takes to ensure the unmanned aircraft are used strictly for purposes consistent with international humanitarian law, and what measures exist to evaluate the outcome when their weapons have been used. “Otherwise, you have the really problematic bottom line — which is that the Central Intelligence Agency is running a program which is killing significant numbers of people, and there is absolutely no accountability in terms of the relevant international laws,” he said.

– edited from The Associated Press, 27 October 2009
PeaceMeal, Nov/December 2009

U.S. is odd man out of cluster bomb ban

When representatives of 111 nations agreed May 28 on a new international treaty to ban the production, use, stockpiling and export of all existing cluster bombs, the United States was absent. The U.S. government did not attend the negotiations in Dublin, Ireland, and actively worked to undermine them. Russia, China, Israel, India and Pakistan, all leading cluster bomb makers like the United States, also boycotted the May talks. But in the end, all other major NATO countries joined with the majority in committing their governments to stop using these weapons and to destroy their existing stockpiles within eight years.

In a major diplomatic defeat for the United States, Britain broke ranks and joined the other 110 nations. Though many U.S. and British military officials consider cluster bombs valuable weapons, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown overruled elements of his own military and threw his support behind the ban. The new Convention on Cluster Munitions, which international leaders expect to sign in December, also requires governments to clear existing cluster munition minefields and to provide adequate assistance to individuals and communities affected by cluster munitions.

A cluster bomb is a large bomb that is dropped from high altitude, descends toward the earth, and explodes at low altitude dispersing hundreds of tiny bomblets. The bomblets descend further and explode when they detect proximity to the earth, shooting tiny pellets of steel in every direction. When the pellets strike people, they tear them apart.

Cluster bombs are designed to kill or maim every living thing in an area as large as two or three football fields. The vast majority of victims of cluster bombs have been civilians rather than combatants. Moreover, some bomblets fail to explode, resulting in a widely dispersed minefield that threatens civilians for years after the fighting stops. In Vietnam, people are still being killed as a result of cluster bombs and other ordnance left from the war there. The brightly colored, butterfly shaped bomblets are especially attractive to children, who think they are a toy.

According to a June report by the Congressional Research Service, the U.S. dropped more than 1,200 cluster bombs — containing nearly 250,000 submunitions — in Afghanistan from 2001-2002. And U.S. and British forces used about 13,000 of the bombs — with more than 1.8 million bomblets — during the first three weeks of the “shock and awe” invasion of Iraq.

Cluster bombs were also used by the U.S. in the 2004 siege of Fallujah, a city of 350,000 people. A group of Iraqi doctors, belonging to the humanitarian organization Doctors For Iraq, went into Fallujah to provide emergency medical aid to civilians. One said, “In the third day of the siege, they used the cluster bomb. And in that day we didn’t work as doctors. We just collected the heads of children and women — heads and limbs. And I remember our duty was just to find the appropriate limb with the appropriate body and head so we can put it in one bag, so we can prepare it for being buried. That night was six hours. It was so long, six hours!”

The Pentagon announced on July 7 that it would continue to use and export even the most unreliable cluster bombs for the next decade. A three-page memo signed by Defense Secretary Robert Gates would require more than 99 percent of the bomblets in a cluster bomb to detonate, but not until after 2018. The memo states that “blanket elimination of cluster munitions is unacceptable.”

The new policy represents a real step backward. Since 2005 it has been Pentagon policy to only buy new cluster bombs with a dud rate of less than 1 percent.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-VT, who has led efforts to outlaw cluster munitions, said a defense policy issued in early 2001 by then- Defense Secretary William Cohen called for a similar reduction in submunitions from the cluster bombs by 2005. “Now the Bush administration’s ‘new’ policy is to wait another 10 years,” said Leahy, calling it “another squandered opportunity for U.S. leadership.”

A bill was introduced in the U.S. Senate last year to limit the use, sale, and transfer of cluster munitions. The Cluster Munitions Civilian Protection Act of 2007 (S 594) was referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations and no action has been taken on it since. Please urge your senators to sign on as co-sponsors.

– edited from the U.S. Campaign to Ban Landmines, National Catholic Reporter, The Associated Press and Los Angeles Times
PeaceMeal, Sept/October 2008

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.)

IED - ‘Made in the USA’

Roadside bombings of American troops in Iraq were occurring with unnerving regularity when military investigators made a disturbing discovery: American-made computer circuits sold to a trading company in the United Arab Emirates had turned up in the bomb detonators.

American officials have been increasingly alarmed about trade in the U.A.E. since 2002, when Commerce Department spot checks of factories and freight forwarders made it clear that dual-use American products subject to export controls, including computer equipment, aircraft parts and specialized metals that have a potential military use, were being diverted on a wide scale to Iran, Syria and Pakistan.

Although the U.A.E. government has taken some superficial action, executives at several of the companies suspected of violating American export controls said they had faced no increased scrutiny.

– The New York Times, April 2, 2008
PeaceMeal, March/April 2008

Many leave firearms loaded

About 1.7 million U.S. children live in homes that have loaded and unlocked guns, according to what is described as the first comprehensive survey of gun storage in homes across the country. The study, published Sept. 6 in the journal Pediatrics, found that 2.5 percent of children live in homes with loaded and unsecured firearms. Estimates from the early 1990s had put the percentage at 10 percent.

The new results suggest a decline, but that doesn't mean there's cause for celebration, said Catherine Okoro, a study author. "That's still too many children to be put at risk," said Okoro, an epidemiologist with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

The study is based on a 2002 telephone survey of about 241,000 adults and is the first to provide data on gun storage in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, its authors said.

Nationally, 33 percent of adults said they kept firearms in or around their home. The highest percentage was in Wyoming, where 63 percent said they had firearms. The lowest percentage was reported in the District of Columbia, where 5 percent reported having guns at home. The district has long-standing bans on handguns and semiautomatic weapons.

A little more than 4 percent of the respondents nationally said they keep guns loaded and unlocked, and 2.5 percent reported having loaded, unlocked firearms in homes where children lived. Alabama had the highest proportion of homes in which children lived and guns were kept loaded and unlocked.

– The Associated Press, Sept. 7, 2005
PeaceMeal, Sept/October 2005