Ban on cluster bomb production due to pass into international humanitarian law, despite absence of US, Russia signatures »
Posted By gamahuche 7 months, 1 week ago in Health & FitnessGovernments from around the world today began signing an international convention banning the production of cluster bombs – unexploded canisters that have killed and maimed thousands of civilians and remain scattered dozen of countries.
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gamahuche
"I would rather be a square peg than fit in a pigeon hole" -
an essay which won me the "Lamb Essay Prize" at the Religious ...
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gamahuche7 months, 1 week ago
Isn't it interesting how these initiatives are always ignored by the so-called "Great Powers"?
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The effects of napalm were bad enough but these lethal "clusters" are the "gift that keeps on giving", indiscriminately slaughtering and maiming innocent civilian populations indefinitely.
Wouldn't it be nice if this ban also mandated that all the perpetrators should be held responsible for removing every last single-one of their lethal toys - with a punitive fine for each day that the task is left undone?
Something like a parking ticket..-
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hyperbola7 months, 1 week ago
In this case "great powers" means china, russia, israel and the US. Nice company for us to be in as we preach to the world about liberty, democracy and equal rights for all.
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Today I was reading a Spanish newspaper and was heartened to see a picture of the Minister of Defense (a woman) visiting the factory where the first of the Spanish cluster bombs were being dismatled and destroyed. -
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memestryker7 months, 1 week ago
The "great powers" realize that psychopaths aren't going anywhere and there may be times when this appears to be the only way to stop a particularly nasty one (or group). We don't yet have the mental health knowledge to allow us to prevent psychopathy. And we know the psychopaths will keep secretly developing this or worse.
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Although emotionally I want to believe that feel good agreements like this will work, as someone who has studied psychology, I just don't think it's rational to think such agreements are anything more than joining hands and singing kumbayah--all the while the psychopaths are laughing to themselves.
Notice that whenever a group of people disarm themselves in any way, they eventually come to regret it and rely on those who did not disarm to come to their aid. -
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Candida7 months, 1 week ago
gamahuche: "Isn't it interesting how these initiatives are always ignored by the so-called "Great Powers"?"
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These were my first thoughts as well. Although I applaud the nations who are signing this agreement, it's always the same story: those who don't use them sign the agreement and those who do don't. As soon as the story started on the evening news where I first heard about it, I commented: "I bet the US won't sign." Why should they? After all, they couldn't sign the land-mine treaty either. How could they when they "need" those mines? -
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Endoscopy7 months, 1 week ago
ROTFLMAO
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In England once in a while they still discover unexpleded bombs from WW2. There as been a technique to have the bomb deactivate itself after a period of time. But any safety device can be overcome with stupidity. I think that only the US currently makes them that way. -
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delvandan2 months ago
Nice idea , but I don't realy think it's feasible. ;)
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It seems that even the usual rules don't apply to so-called "Great Powers".
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Dionys7 months, 1 week ago
And used liberally against international law by Israel.
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It's very sad. -
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Endoscopy7 months, 1 week ago
What is sad is that some people seem to make war impossible to avoid.
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gamahuche7 months, 1 week ago
Now that I've got my splenetic point of view in play lets look at the glass half-full too - actually already 100 out of 192 member states have signed on - and a toast to Norway, where they have the lemmings rushing off the cliff as a regular reminder of the insanity of nature, including the human variety.
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FTA:
At the Oslo signing ceremony, Norway, which has led the efforts to ban cluster munitions, was the first country to sign. It was followed by Laos, where cluster bombs dropped by US planes more than 30 years ago are still killing civilians; and Lebanon, which was attacked with the weapons by Israel.
By the end of tomorrow, around 100 of the United Nations' 192 members will have signed up. Once 30 countries have ratified the convention, it will become part of international humanitarian law.
There are a number of notable absentees, including the US, China, Russia, India and Pakistan, as well as Israel, which fired cluster bombs during the 2006 Lebanon war. -
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Candida7 months, 1 week ago
Newperson: "I'm so grateful to live in a country where we can walk around the country side with out land mines war heads and so on. God bless the ones that cant."
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I'm not sure I understand your comment. Are you saying that you are grateful that you live in a country that buries and scatters these awful weapons and not in a country where they are buried and scattered? Or do you simply feel sorry for those in whose county your government and its allies scatter these weapons? -
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dissent7 months, 1 week ago
what you call a blessing is just more of that good ol' kool aid hypocrisy
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alakazam7 months, 1 week ago
I am glad to hear that entire nations are speaking out against the use of "Total War" weaponry.
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I hope it will make a difference.
I shudder to think of the things hidden away in the armories of the World. I don't like it...in my heart I believe that if someone will use any dread weapon they are just one step away from using the next in the pile.
Peaceful solutions need to be found before it goes even further than it has. I think how wonderful it would be if one day we could beat all our swords into plowshares. I am maybe too much of a realist to think that day will ever come for everyone,but I know that waging war upon the innocent is wrong.
I hope the signatory countries will apply serious pressure over the issue.-
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alakazam7 months, 1 week ago
Years ago I read a goofy but entertaining novel..."Mission Earth".
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There was a part in the story where a bunch of women got together and raised hell until the U.N granted them the right "not to be beaten or thermonuclear bombed".
I think that's a great idea!!!!
Good people who really care are gonna have to start speaking up for what's right
I think the great majority of us know right from wrong. We need to restore some decency to the world. -
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Radiofreeeuropa7 months, 1 week ago
And how much aversion to this policy simply originates because of profits from producer nations? I don't know for certain, but I'd be willing to bet like most things, ...follow the money.
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Spadecaller7 months, 1 week ago
Thanks g. Sorry, I am late to respond. Cluster bombs are the weapons of choice for terrorists. Being that terrorism is "the unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives," it goes against international law to intentionally target civilians. And, by the very nature of these weapons and their proven "effectiveness" the government already knows that they will kill civilians when they are employed. In actuality, according to international law, they are illegal.
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Like RFE, I suspect the sale and use of these weapons is quite lucrative for those selling and manufacturing them. Hopefully, the day will come when the whistle is blown and the pictures of its victims are exposed on these forums so the entire world can condemn there use once and for all.-
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gamahuche7 months, 1 week ago
SC - greatly appreciated..
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Perhaps on the contrary I should explain that my absence on a couple of your recent posts has been based on a feeling of frustration and powerlessness that has been virtual head-banging-against the wall.
The night of the Mumbai attacks, for example, I was awake all night with the BBC World Service and the Rabbi story was already featured there strongly. I couldn't bring myself to revisit it publicly when you posted it because I was unwilling to contemplate any potential disrespect of this story.
It is NOT about keeping quiet as they take away your neighbour!
I've taken on the Metropolitan Police of London and bamboozled them to the point where they were playing us "secret" recordings of meetings held in our home over the phone..
Sufficient was to know the password and the numbers on the secret exchange.
Of course they raided us shortly afterwards but failed to find the "smoking gun" - disguised as a typewriter which was laying in plain view..
P.S. I'm unworried about this disclosure because these events occurred in 1962
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RRcon7 months, 1 week ago
I agree entirely with banning these weapons. But is there any such weapon that is humane? Really, how much sense is there in rule of war. It's like your going to have a fight with someone on the street, and you agree that you'll limit the length of knives to six inches. To have to come to a point that you need to fight, you already lost, or so I believe. But lets say you agree with a friendly nation, or a group of friendly nations that you won't use certain types of weapons. You all agree and sign a treaty. Down the road, war brakes out. Can all those nations that signed that treaty, are they to be trusted?
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I am in know way justifying anyone that refuses to, or agrees to signing the treaty. All I'm saying is that the old addage that all is fair in love and war, and that treaties aren't necessarily worth the paper that they are written on.
The only deterrent to war is the ultimate weapon, a weapon so powerful that if used, the enemy would be anhillated. As long as the enemy has the same weapon, then there is peace.-
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Spadecaller7 months, 1 week ago
"As long as the enemy has the same weapon, then there is peace."
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As long as the enemy values their own lives...which is not always the case. -
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CHAM7 months, 1 week ago
Thanks for this very important post Gama. The last sentence of the post really got my attention. It stated that any weapon of less than 10 bomblets was excluded from the U N Resolution.
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The World's most common system utilizing bomblets has nine bomblets in the warhead stack. Coincidence?-
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gamahuche7 months, 1 week ago
Yuck! I missed that!!
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The devil really IS in the detail, isn't it?
So back to the drawing-board..
Number 9, number 9..
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Daylight7 months, 1 week ago
And used liberally against international law by Israel.
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It's very sad.
Israel, America and other Western nations have all the right in their own head to use them or drop them wherever they feel fit. Israel has dropped millions of cluster bombs in Lebanon and will continue to do so in the future with the support of the United States of America. -
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cowboygrandpa7 months, 1 week ago
Gama:
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Sorry I got here so late I've been working a lot of overtime lately. Got to work it while it is there.
Although I hate these types of bombs, I think a ban on them would only end up in the same situation as the Japanese and Germany prior to WWII. They just ignored the treaties and prepared for all out war.
I say keep the stockpile we have as protection against other nations using them and gaining a virtual impassable mine field of non exploded body bag fillers.
I am not naive enough to believe that just because someone signs a treaty they will honor it. It is usually one who is pushing hard for it that is in some way going to take advantage one way or another.
I remember watching footage of the Hamburg and Dressden raids when the incendiaries were dropped and roasted the populace and destroyed the cities.
We did the same thing to Japan. If we get rid of one thing there is another.
I think man must realize that war is not profitable in order to ever obtain a lasting and true peace. Until then we better be armed and ready to defend ourselves.
Don't forget that for every peace loving person out there, there is at least one if not two who want to desroy something someone else has.-
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gamahuche7 months, 1 week ago
I respect your opinion cbgp but in my lifetime I have seen numerous miracles of reconciliation which were deemed impossible.
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Starting with the re-integration of Germany and Japan in the post-war world order.
Some are tougher..
I'm still waiting for China to surender its obtuse attitude to Tibet - but I NEVER give up belief in the potential triumph of the human spirit - I owe my very existence to it, born in Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia of a Jewish father and a mother who, as an employee of the British Council was effectively a British spy.
We were nevertheless protected, all of us.
The blessings which emerge from these trials are the sense of the preciousness of every life and a marvellous faith in serendipity.
In world affairs I've learnt to never say never and to be personally unafraid in virtually any situation - which does not mean tempting fate by foolhardiness but it does mean factoring risks and playing the odds.
For a number of years I was also a professional gambler on horses, in England; unfortunately the rules of the game changed that it became impossible to beat the book. Then I became a bookie :)
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alyysaeden008Comment removed: Spam
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CHAM7 months, 1 week ago
The thing about cluster munitions is that they are not easily made nor are they easily transported to the target.
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Most of the countries who utilize the bomblets have the wherewithal to manufacture them in mass quantities. And absolutely they have the delivery systems. For these two reasons the third world countries are not likely to be much of a force in this type weapon. It was designed to use against armies. But basically the use by Western Countries has been to attack populations.
It was kind of like the supreme worry about Iraq having the Nuclear Bomb. Building such is extremely difficult but even if Saddam could have built one, how was he going to deliver it?
And also it's the same thing as having a bullet with no gun to deliver it. If you don't have the gun you better carry your slingshot. A slingshot and a bullet are kind of like a rock and a slingshot. Don't take those weapons to a gunfight. -
mackiemesserComment removed: User banned.
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Kaphy7 months, 1 week ago
It is nice to learn that countries are in favor of this campaign and they do not concerned about US lobby anymore.
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http://jobssingapore.wordpress.com -
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vicbar887 months, 1 week ago
If you do not want to be involved in War then don't join the military and don't hang out with terrorists or and by all means don't hang out on a battlefield. It's really pretty simple.
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lloydm657 months, 1 week ago
Daylight:Lebanon was at one a great country, the light of the middle east.Christian were able to worship openly,night life was great beautiful hotels,casinos,and gracious people.They didn't have a problem with Israel.and still don't.Iran,and Syria have flooded the country with the most vile creatures on earth,Hezbollah.I don't know any words for them,evil just don't quite cover them
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CHAM7 months, 1 week ago
Lebanon indeed was once the envy of the Middle East. There was no such thing as Hezbollah when Israel first invaded Lebanon. They formed later, for the purpose of driving Israel out of Lebanon.
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The last 24 hours that Israel was in Lebanon this last time they left 3,000,000 bomblets on the ground in residential areas that they had just occupied.
They did this to keep Hezbollah from rebuilding the homes that had been destroyed during the hostilities.
OK you all can start to call me Anti-Semitic, etc., but again I think the truth ought to be spoken. I am not a Hezbollah sympathizer at all, but those people in Lebanon long ago found out who would help them. You might recall that when Israel invaded, the Lebanese Army never engaged the Israeli Army. The total resistance to the Israeli Army was Hezbollah and their soldiers. The Head of the Lebanese Government wanted Israel to destroy Hezbollah because they were getting powerful enough politically to become the majority in the Government. -
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