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<<previous | index | next>> Global Trade in Cluster MunitionsAccording to available information, at least twelve countries have transferred over fifty different types of cluster munitions to at least fifty-eight other countries. However, the true scope of the global trade in cluster munitions is difficult to ascertain. International arms exhibitions and marketing publications regularly include projectiles, bombs, and rockets that are cluster munitions. Notifications of arms transfers as required by domestic law in some countries provide some knowledge of the trade patterns. Examples of transfers of cluster munitions are contained in the following table. However, this is by no means a comprehensive accounting of the global trade in cluster munitions.
Examples of Known Exports of Cluster Munitions
* Countries that have reported subsequently disposing of or are in the process of disposing of the weapons Most of these types of cluster munitions are known to be inaccurate and have high failure rates. For example, Human Rights Watch has documented that four types of cluster munitions exported by the United States have a history of producing especially high numbers of hazardous submunition duds in combat operations in Iraq, Kuwait, Yugoslavia, and Afghanistan: surface-launched M26 MLRS rockets and DPICM artillery projectiles, and Rockeye and CBU-87 CEM air-dropped cluster bombs. The proliferation of these weapons to over two dozen other countries underscores the concerns of global proliferation of cluster munitions. More recently, the United States announced in October 2004 its intent to transfer to Turkey a small number of CBU-103 Combined Effects Munitions and AGM-154 Joint Stand-Off Weapons; as noted above, these more advanced cluster munitions are still problematic from a humanitarian perspective. Some transfers of cluster munitions have occurred as surplus munitions are phased out of active service and provided to allies at little or no cost. As an example, the United States transferred over 61,000 artillery projectiles containing 8.1 million submunitions to Bahrain and Jordan between 1995 and 2001 as this type of ammunition was being phased out of the U.S. inventory. These transfers are detailed in the following table: Transfers of Excess U.S. Cluster Munitions to Bahrain and Jordan,1995-2001
This information displayed above is contained in public records maintained by the U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency. According to the results of life-cycle testing compiled by the U.S. Army Technical Center for Explosives Safety, the dud rates for the submunitions contained in the types of artillery projectiles range from 4.8 percent (M509A1) to 14.27 percent (M449, M483). Thus, the potential exists to create over 600,000 hazardous dud submunitions if these projectiles are ever used.
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