Margin of error? Eh? I’m not sure what you mean. Cluster bombs by design are a pretty indiscriminate area effect weapon. If you mean that’s a very high number of dud submunitions, I agree. 100K dud bomblets at 359 sites would suggest 278.5 dud bomblets per site. Without knowing how many canisters were dropped at each site, it’s hard to interpret, but I would agree that it’s suggestive of some very poor quality control.
From here the reliability requirement is normally 95%, so multiplying the 100K duds by 20 and dividing by 200 would suggest that number might be expected from about 10,000 CBU-87 1,000lb weapons, which is about as many as the USAF dropped during the whole of Desert Storm. I’m not sure how many units the IDF dropped, or of what type, but 100,000 does sound a lot. On the other hand, the numbers may not be accurate.
All this is assuming they were standard impact submunitions. If they were area denial (mines) then 100K would be pretty trivial - 500 canisters or so. However air scattering mines is a bit of a no-no these days and I would have expected a hue and cry if they had been used widely.
Assuming the Israelis used big munitions like the MK22, 100,000 bomblets represents the payload of 50 complete bombs.
Since “Submunition function reliability requirement is no less than 95 percent” (see cite), they must have either dropped 1,000 of the things, or programmed some to land without detonating.
You’d have to say that it was an extremely cynical move by Israel, looks like a long term punishment for the civilian population.
When you consider that Israel has made great play of targeting to avoid civilian casualties, its a bit of an eyebrow raiser when their only counter claim in their defence is that the cluster bombs were ‘not illegal’.
The excuse that Hizbollah were hiding among the civilian population does not seem much like any sort of justification to me, I can understand a conventional bomb in such an area to hit an immediate threat, such are the consequencies of Hizbollah behaviour, but to then ensure that in the longer term the area cannot be used for normal living space appears to be an act of punishment and revenge.
It was also pretty clear some time ago that there would be some sort of ceasefire, and yets its precisely during this time that Israel has stepped up its use of cluster bombs, and their military chiefs are certainly not stupid they will know what the effect of this will be.
So now from having legitimacy in defending itself, Israel has used up a lot of sympathy, and the state department investigation will not come to any findings that will mean sanctions of any sort against Israelm that ain’t gonna happen, the powers of the state department are being emphasised so that it seems that this matter will be taken seriously, the outcome is a foregone conclusion, something along the lines of
'That wasn’t very nice of you to do that Israel, we’d rather you try to avoid using cluster bombs like this again, or at least do it in a way that will not attract criticism, ‘cause it kinda makes us look bad, being as we sold you these things’
It’s almost as Israel did this because they knew a lot of unexploded cluster bomblets would be lying around. Maybe it was to prevent civilians from returning to their home
Thanks for the links. It looks like these bomblets can be set to explode on impact or after a certain amount of time (assuming they aren’t stepped on first.) Any idea how the IDF was using them?
How much punch does one of these bomblets pack? I’m not sure how such a thing is measured.
As that very informative link indicates, there are several kinds. The mostly likely US inventory bomblets for antipersonnel use are about the size of a billiard ball, maybe slightly smaller & are essentially aerially delivered hand grenades.
If oone goes off within 5 feet of your unprotected body you’re dead. 10 feet, seriously injured. 20 feet, maybe injured, maybe not. 50 feet, scared & your ears ring for a minute. None of the frag will have the energy to penetrate a brick or concrete block wall, even up close.
If you ran over one in a car & set it off, the car’s probably toast & you’ve got a 50/50 chance of dead vs injured. The flimsier or more open the car, the worse the outcome.
The real problem with dud bomblets is that since they’re pretty stable until disturbed, they tend to go off only in immediate proximity to somebody.
Hmmm. Interesting - I totally failed to remember that artillery and MLRS systems can fire submunition payloads. That would certainly explain the numbers.
Not entirely sure where that stuff about phospherous being illegal comes from though - it’s pretty much A-OK to use it so long as you’re not firing it into residential areas. I think the ICRC is indulging in some wishful thinking.
you must remember that if the lebanese population had not quite happily allowed hizbollah terrorists not only to flood into their country without any sort of protest (amazing how if you cross enough palms with iranian oil money the locals are soooo glad to see you !) but stood by while they constructed bunkers and THEN built apartment blocks on top of the bunkers ! if you accept a kickback from a murderer to use your upstairs bedroom to snipe from ,dont start complaining when the police begin firing back at your windows
!
How does this justify the use of ordnance that will have no military use after the conflict is over, and when the casualties are going to be unarmed civilians , and significantly, around one third of which will be children, according to the anti mine sites I read.
