President Biden has reportedly decided to send U.S. cluster bombs to Ukraine as a way to boost Kyiv’s counteroffensive against occupying Russian forces.
Discussion of the controversial weapons, which would be part of an $800 million package of U.S. military aid to Ukraine expected be announced Friday, came amid confusion over the whereabouts of the leader of an abortive military coup against President Vladimir Putin’s government.
Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko said exiled Wagner Group mercenary force chief Yevgeny Prigozhin had left the country and returned home to Russia just weeks after leading the mutiny.
The White House declined to comment on the Prigozhin reports and there was no immediate confirmation from the Kremlin on Mr. Prigozhin’s fate or the location of thousands of his mercenary fighters who had been taking part in the fighting in Ukraine.
“We don’t follow his movements. We have neither the ability nor the desire to do so,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters in Moscow.
Mr. Lukashenko said he had a telephone conversation with the Wagner Group leader on Wednesday in which they discussed the mercenary army’s future.
“He told me one thing, ‘I will work for the good of Russia and will fulfill our duty to the end,’” the Belarusian president said, according to BelTA, the country’s state-owned news agency.
Asked about reports that cluster munition warheads — banned by more than 120 countries for their lethal effect and potential for causing civilian casualties — could be supplied to Ukraine, a Pentagon spokesman Thursday would only confirm that the proposal is “under consideration” by the White House.
But The Associated Press, citing “people familiar with the decision,” reported that the controversial munitions would be included.
Cluster munitions, including artillery projectiles and rockets, are designed to break apart in midflight and scatter smaller munitions over a large area. Ukraine had appealed for them and U.S. lawmakers have been pressing the White House to provide them for several months. They said the decision would alleviate pressure on NATO’s shrinking munition supply.
“The United States has nearly three million of these rounds in its inventory — much of it located on U.S. and allied bases,” top Senate and House Republicans said in a March 21 letter to the president. “No individual munition or system will prove to be the key to restoring Ukraine’s territorial integrity. However, we believe that [cluster bombs] could help fill a key gap for Ukraine’s military.”
U.S. officials say Russian forces are already using cluster munitions on the battlefield and in populated civilian areas during their 15-month invasion of Ukraine.
Ukraine has made steady but slow progress in its much-anticipated counter-offensive launched last month. But military officials acknowledge that Russia’s elaborate tangle of minefields, trenches and barbed wire on the front line has been a challenge.
“Our military analysts have confirmed that [cluster munitions] would be useful, especially against dug-in Russian positions on the battlefield,” Laura Cooper, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia told lawmakers last month.
Human rights groups say they will oppose any transfer of cluster munitions because of the “foreseeable and lasting harm” from the weapons. Mary Wareham, acting arms director at Human Rights Watch, said Ukraine and Russia are both killing civilians with their current supply.
“Transferring cluster munitions disregards the substantial danger they pose to civilians and undermines the global effort to ban them,” Ms. Wareham said Thursday in a statement. “Both sides should immediately stop using them and not try to get more of these indiscriminate weapons.”
The Defense Department has multiple cluster bomb variants in its arsenal. A Pentagon spokesman said they are aware of reports that some cluster munitions that would be fired by artillery may have failure rates higher than 2.35%.
“We would be carefully selecting rounds with lower ‘dud rates’ for which we have recent test data,” Air Force Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder told reporters. “The ones that we are considering providing would not include older variants with [higher failure] rates.”
The Pentagon said it also could not confirm reports that Mr. Prigozhin had returned to Russia. Mr. Lukashenko told reporters at a press conference in Minsk that Mr. Prigozhin was in St. Petersburg but may have gone to Moscow.
Mr. Prigozhin has not been seen in public since he left Rostov-on-Don, a city in southern Russia that his troops briefly occupied during their march on Moscow. Mr. Lukashenko said he doesn’t believe the mercenary army leader’s safety is in question if he returns home.
“If you think that Putin is so malicious and vindictive that [Mr. Prigozhin] will be ‘killed’ tomorrow, no, this will not happen,” Mr. Lukashenko said. “At the moment, all agreements are being observed.”
Left unexplained is why Mr. Putin tolerated Mr. Prigozhin and his independent military force for so long, why he allowed Mr. Prigozhin to openly criticize top generals and Defense Ministry officials for their handling of the war, and why the mercenary chief would want to return to Russia so soon after leading a revolt that openly challenged Mr. Putin’s authority and nearly led to civil war.
• Mike Glenn can be reached at mglenn@washingtontimes.com.
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