While I agree with Kimberley McCosker and Gilles Nouzies of Handicap International that Cambodia should sign the Convention on Cluster Munitions (“Cambodia Should Sign the Convention on Cluster Munitions,” May 30), much of their argument misses the point.
The 26 million submunitions dropped on Cambodia in the 1960s and ’70s would have been dropped even if the convention had been in existence and Cambodia had signed it. They were dropped by the U.S. government, which did not consider the wishes or the welfare of Cambodians.
—Letter to the Editor—
The U.S. has not signed the convention. (Nor, according to Wikipedia, have China, Russia, Israel, India, Pakistan or Brazil. But at least those six, unlike the U.S., do not assert the right to send armed drones to kill people in other countries whenever they feel like it.)
So yes, Cambodia’s signature might put a little moral pressure on the U.S. But campaigning against cluster bombs would do better to focus on the real source of danger.
Allen Myers
Phnom Penh
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