President Joe Biden’s administration confirmed that the controversial cluster bomb munitions it sent to Ukraine are being deployed against Russian forces.
As previously reported by The Dallas Express, Biden said that he was sending the bombs because Ukraine was running out of ammunition.
“They are using them appropriately. They’re using them effectively and they are actually having an impact on Russia’s defensive formations and Russia’s defensive maneuvering. I think I can leave it at that,” said John Kirby, the National Security Council’s coordinator for strategic communications, according to CNN.
Cluster munitions have been banned in over 100 countries because they release a large number of smaller explosives that can detonate over a wide target area. Additionally, they can pose a threat to civilians, acting like landmines when they do not explode as intended.
Russian President Vladimir Putin previously said that if Ukraine used cluster bombs against Russian troops, he would deploy his country’s own stockpile of the controversial munition, Reuters reported. However, multiple media accounts have claimed that Russia has used them repeatedly in Ukraine over the last year.
Video footage posted by Open Source Intelligence Monitor on Twitter allegedly shows a Ukrainian cluster bomb strike against Russian soldiers.
Footage that is reported to show the 1st Confirmed use of U.S. Cluster Munitions by the Ukrainian Armed Forces against a recent Russian Assault near the City of Krasnohorivka in the Donetsk Region, during which it is the claimed the Russian Mil-Blogger, Mikhail Luchin was Killed. pic.twitter.com/wssiWDZA6y
— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) July 20, 2023
“We’d like to get very fast results, but in reality it’s practically impossible. The more infantry who die here, the more their relatives back in Russia will ask their government ‘why?'” said Ukrainian military commander Oleksandr Syrskyi, defending Ukraine’s deployment of cluster bombs, according to BBC.
“If the Russians didn’t use them, perhaps conscience would not allow us to do it too,” Syrskyi said.
Several members of Congress had lobbied the Biden administration to ship Ukraine cluster bombs, despite a growing sentiment among some lawmakers that the United States is spending too much taxpayer money on Ukraine’s war effort.
“We remain deeply disappointed by your administration’s reluctance to provide Ukraine with the right type and amount of long-range fires and maneuver capability to create and exploit operational breakthroughs against the Russians,” read a letter to the president written by Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID), Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS), Rep. Mike McCaul (R-TX), and Rep. Mike Rogers (R-AL) back in March.