Sian Berry spots outlawed cluster bombs on display at arms fair - but pensioners protesting genocide are the ones being dragged away by cops
Why does an arms fair even exist? Some psycho oligarch shit happening out there.
For the same reason any trade show exists. To make deals.
I think it’s for the defence industry to network and customers (militaries and other state actors mostly) to get to know what’s available.
She may have seen cluster munitions at the fare.
But that picture shows an 84 mm combined impact/time fuze for a M-84 Carl Gustav recoilless rifle round and an 81 mm fuze tip for a 81 mm mortar round. The timed fuze is quite nasty - you set it for distance (by flight time) with a view to have it detonate above or to the side of infantry under cover.
Neither if these are cluster munitions, however. I’ve used both back in my army days.
So if that picture is her proof she’s at best misguided.
I can’t wait to get downvoted for facts.
I am downvoting you for bitching about downvotes.
Just to be clear.
I downvoted this, largely because while you may have identified the photo correctly the way you’ve done so here makes it sound like Berry has made a mistake when there’s no evidence of that from the article.
From her X post (why the fuck are these people still on X?):
Confirmed by staff, and removed swiftly by event organisers.
I literally started my comment off by acknowledging that she might have seen cluster munitions but downvote away.
Can you explain how a munition exploding near infantry causing mayhem and death is different from a cluster bomb doing so?
Or is the main difference going to be scale and wordplay to claim legality of ownership/sale?
Cluster munitions has a clear definition. It acquired a clear definition when the treaty was drafted. Cluster munitions release a … cluster (group) of smaller munitions that themselves explode on impact:
conventional munition that is designed to disperse or release explosive submunitions each weighing less than 20 kilograms, and includes those explosive submunitions. Submunition is a conventional munition that in order to perform its task is dispersed or released by a cluster munition and is designed to function by detonating an explosive charge prior to, on or after impact.”
Fragmentation munitions break apart and the fragments cause death and destruction.
If someone claims that she’s seen cluster munitions that were outlawed, she’s claiming to have seen cluster munitions that were outlawed, not fragmentation munitions. We may not like either, I certainly don’t, but one type is out of use in signatory countries and another type is not.
The picture she’s used it’s actually not even munitions, it’s fuzes, ie the thing that makes munitions detonate.
And in full detail, cluster munitions are still “legal” in signatory countries, provided the submunitions self-detonate after a time. The Oslo treaty was designed to prevent civilians, children especially, picking up unexploded submunitions. It wasn’t designed to prevent death and destruction in a military target.
obligatory “why were you at the gay bar” comment
Probably to draw attention to an arms fair peddling banned weapons being held in the UK.
There definitely needs to be more people who aren’t interested in peddling death attending these events to ensure that they play within the very broad guidelines afforded them.
