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Dems rip Biden for launching Houthi strikes without congressional approval
(www.politico.com)
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this post was submitted on 12 Jan 2024
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The US no longer makes leave in place mines. They are all command detonated. That was a Clinton thing. The cluster bombs... We're actually phasing them out of our arsenal. However the US maintains they're legal as long as they're not used in urban areas. Largely because Russia and China still use them and they're very effective. We'd need to get them seriously on board to actually stop making cluster munitions.
We continue to use them on the Korean divide, probably the most heavily mined place on earth. And while we've definitely updated our arsenal, I would not bet my life on the reliability of these ostensibly more advanced systems.
Sure. By selling them to our allies.
Well, they're cheap by tonnage, which is why the Russians love them. But they're also unreliable, which is what makes them so dangerous. They don't always detonate where they land, and that makes them function as land mines after the fact. They are only "effective" in the sense that they're explosive devices that litter a large area.
As to China, when was the last time they bombed anyone? Like, at all? To my knowledge, the Chinese haven't been involved in a war since they signed a peace deal with Vietnam in the 70s. The closest we've seen has been police actions along border territories (Xinjiang getting a bunch of jihadist spillover from Afghanistan, slap fights with Indian border guard counterparts, etc). Who have they been dropping cluster bombs on, in living memory even?
The DMZ landmines have been there for 70 years and de-mining that would come with serious risks of sniper attacks, ambushes, and nuclear war. Yeah it really ramps up that quick over there. All we need is for the Hermit King to think we're clearing breach routes and Seoul goes up. So yeah we're not removing those.
Even under the Trump administration we're sticking to "non-permanent" landmines. The most prominent and widespread of which is the command activated claymore.
Most of our allies are also getting rid of cluster bombs. And when Ukraine specifically asked for them we hesitated to sell them. The reason we did so is because of parity in that war. And while they aren't reliable enough to leave the area safe of UXO, they are extremely reliable at destroying military equipment.
China matters because they're constantly threatening military action.