Congress Presses Biden to Deliver Cluster Munitions to Ukraine

A bipartisan cadre of lawmakers is calling on the Biden administration to send cluster munitions to Ukraine in a move that could help Kyiv bust through fortified Russian lines that have stalled the ongoing Ukrainian counteroffensive, but whose use could also raise serious human rights concerns. 

In a letter sent to U.S. President Joe Biden on Friday, Reps. Joe Wilson, Steve Cohen, and Victoria Spartz—a bipartisan grouping atop the Helsinki Commission—urged the White House to send dual-purpose improved conventional munitions, better known by the acronym DPICMs, to Ukraine to assist in the ongoing counteroffensive. The weapon, which can be fired from artillery cannons and scatter up to 88 bomblets onto the battlefield, could help Ukraine cut through Russian tanks and dug-in positions. But if not cleaned up, the bomblets can be left to kill and maim civilians long after the fighting has died down. 

But the push to send the artillery-delivered cluster bombs has intensified within the U.S. administration and on Capitol Hill as the Pentagon has sent—or is prepared to send—weapons at the top of Ukraine’s checklist, starting with howitzers and culminating with F-16 fighter jets. And with Russia successfully clinging to dragon-toothed trench lines, that push is getting stronger. 

“[T]ransferring DPICMs to Ukraine presents an opportunity to provide the Ukrainian Armed Forces with a powerful capability to use against the Russian army and mercenary forces,” the lawmakers wrote to Biden on Friday. “Let us use this untapped, vast arsenal in service of Ukrainian victory, and reclaiming Europe’s peace.” The letter was sent to Biden before Wagner Group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin staged an abortive mutiny against Russian President Vladimir Putin that managed to take control of a Kremlin military logistics hub in Rostov-on-Don over the weekend before petering out. 

The question of whether to send Ukraine DPICMs is part of a broader debate within Washington over whether the Biden administration is sending high-end weapons quickly enough and in enough numbers to tilt the battlefield in Ukraine. Russia hawks, including some Republican lawmakers, have argued that the Biden administration has been too slow to approve sending battle tanks and start training Ukrainian pilots on F-16 fighter jets, hampering Ukraine’s ability to carry out a successful counteroffensive. For all the carping from Congress and Kyiv, the Biden administration has sent more than $40 billion in military aid to Ukraine since Russia first launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022, and Ukrainian officials say military aid from the United States and other NATO allies has been decisive in staving off a Russian victory. 

Ukraine has already quietly obtained DPICMs from other NATO allies: Turkey began sending U.S.-designed artillery-fired cluster munitions to Ukraine last fall, Foreign Policy previously reported, but the United States has a much larger arsenal of such weapons—lawmakers believe the stockpiles are around 3 million—that can be fired from the 155 mm howitzers that the Biden administration first provided to Ukraine last year. 

Ukrainian troops also reportedly fired cluster munitions in efforts to take back territory in the eastern Donbas region earlier this year. Experts worry that because the bomblets scatter randomly, civilians could easily mistake them for toys or debris. While the lawmakers nodded at potential human rights concerns stemming from the weapons, they said that Ukraine has been a “responsible steward” of U.S.-provided weapons since the beginning of the war.

“During the Cold War, DPICMs were developed and fielded specifically to counter Russia’s numerical and material superiority,” the lawmakers wrote to Biden. “[A]nd now they can be put to their intended use in Ukraine’s defense—and Ukraine’s defense of Europe, and ultimately, U.S. national security.”

For advocates of the weapon, the urgency of sending it has increased as the wear and tear on Western-provided artillery has put more guns out of action and as artillery ammunition stocks again run perilously low. “The DPICM, when it arrives on target, is killing many more Russians,” said Dan Rice, a former advisor to Ukraine’s top military officer. “So technically, to take out a platoon or company, you’re going to fire far fewer rounds.” The submunitions that come from the DPICM have a shaped charge that can penetrate 4 to 8 inches of armor, Rice said. 

Military analysts who advocate sending Ukraine DPICMs say it could also help address Ukraine’s artillery shortfalls. “Sending DPICMs now would allow Kyiv to conserve its traditional artillery shells and use each type of munition selectively,” John Hardie, the deputy director of the Russia program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank, wrote for Foreign Policy. “If Biden continues to kick the can down the road, he may still be forced to send DPICMs later, when Ukraine’s ammunition shortage grows more dire.”

Other experts say sending cluster munitions would undermine international arms control regimes, including the Convention on Cluster Munitions, aimed at preventing the global spread of these controversial munitions that scatter explosive bomblets across large areas of territory. Neither Russia nor Ukraine is party to the convention. 

The United States is currently barred from exporting the DPICMs. Those legislative restrictions prevent the Pentagon from providing munitions overseas that have more than a 1 percent dud rate, which the cluster bombs have. But within the Biden administration, the tide appears to be turning toward providing the weapons. Biden could present Congress with a waiver allowing the transfer of the controversial munitions to Ukraine, and the latest letter signals he may well have widespread bipartisan backing on the matter. 

On Thursday, Laura Cooper, the Pentagon’s top Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia official, told Congress that cluster munitions would be “useful” to root out dug-in Russian military positions, a seeming shift from last year, when the U.S. administration indicated it was concerned about the prospect of collateral damage and fratricide from DPICMs. That seeming reversal gave more ammunition to U.S. lawmakers, who are convinced it is a necessary step, as Russia uses the advantage of numbers to introduce more massed formations to the war and the Ukrainian counteroffensive makes the battlefield more dynamic. 

The Biden administration has faced ongoing criticism from Congress that U.S.-provided weapons aren’t arriving fast enough, or in great enough numbers, to drive forward the Ukrainian counteroffensive against Russian lines that have hardened into the biggest fortified lines seen in Europe in two generations.

Ukraine and its allies in Congress have launched another campaign to push Biden to send Kyiv long-range weapons known as Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) that can strike targets up to 200 miles away. So far, the administration hasn’t bowed to that pressure, as some officials are wary that such U.S. deliveries could give Ukraine more abilities to strike inside Russian territory, heightening the risk that the war spirals into a military confrontation between Moscow and Washington. 

Though the cluster munitions are near the top of the list of what some U.S. officials and congressional aides believe Ukraine needs for the counteroffensive, alongside long-range weapons and bridging equipment, officials in Kyiv haven’t been able to lobby for everything they want, because they also need to worry about what they simply need. 

“There is a huge bandwidth issue. It’s the same reason why we’ve got soldiers fighting without boots in Ukraine,” said one congressional aide, who spoke on condition of anonymity to speak candidly about the Ukrainian lobbying effort. “Because the [Ukrainian Ministry of Defense] has to focus on the big weapons.”