The United States shares in the international concern about the humanitarian impact of all munitions, including cluster munitions. That is one of the reasons that it spends more than any other country to eliminate the risk to civilians from landmines and all explosive remnants of war, including unexploded cluster munitions. That is also why the United States strongly supports negotiations on cluster munitions within the framework of the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW; http://ccwtreaty.state.gov/aboutccw.htm). All of the nations that produce cluster munitions are represented in the CCW.
Cluster munitions have demonstrated military utility. Their elimination from U.S. stockpiles would put the lives of its soldiers and those of its coalition partners at risk. Moreover, cluster munitions can often result in much less collateral damage than unitary weapons, such as a larger bomb or larger artillery shell would cause, if used for the same mission.
