Flooding South Lebanon - Human Rights Watch

Types of Cluster Munitions and Submunitions Used in Lebanon
In the 2006 conflict in Lebanon, Israel used cluster munitions delivered by artillery
projectiles, ground rockets, and aircraft bombs carrying five main types of
submunitions: M42, M46, M77, M85 (with and without self-destruct devices), and
BLU-63. These submunition types are unguided weapons that pose grave danger to
civilians because of their inaccuracy, wide dispersal pattern, and high dud rates.
Human Rights Watch researchers documented each of the five types lying
unexploded in villages and surrounding fields in south Lebanon.
The M42, M46, M77, and M85 submunitions are DPICMs whose purpose is to injure
persons and pierce armor. The majority of submunitions found in Lebanon have been
DPICMs. These submunitions are cylinder shaped; civilians often describe them as
resembling batteries. Connected to the top of each of these submunitions is a white
ribbon that unfurls when the submunition is released. The ribbon both releases the
firing pin, thus arming the submunition, and orients the submunition so that it falls
with its shaped charge facing downward. 64 The shaped charge is a concave copper
cone inside a DPICM designed to explode and pierce armor when it hits perpendicular
to its target. A metal fragmentation cylinder is designed to explode and kill people.
M42 and M46 submunitions are delivered by M483A1 155mm artillery projectiles.
Each projectile carries 88 M42 and M46 submunitions. Both the submunitions and
the projectiles were made in the United States. The submunitions are able to
penetrate more than 2.5 inches of armor. 65 The test condition failure rate of these two
submunitions is between 3 and 14 percent. 66 As of January 2008, clearance
64 Database of Demining Incidents and Victims, “Ribbon Oriented Dual Purpose Submunition,”
http://www.ddasonline.com/SubsKB1-M42.htm (accessed November 29, 2006).
65 Globalsecurity.org, “Dual-Purpose Improved Conventional Weapons,”
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/dpicm.htm (accessed November 29, 2006).
66 The 3 percent figure is contained in Office of the Under Secretary of Defense (Acquisition, Technology and Logistics),
“Report to Congress: Cluster Munitions,” October 2004. The 14 percent figure is from US Army Defense Ammunition Center,
Technical Center for Explosives Safety, “Study of Ammunition Dud and Low Order Detonation Rates,” July 2000, p. 9, and
Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, “Unexploded Ordnance Report,” undated,
but transmitted to the US Congress on February 29, 2000, table 2-3, p. 5.
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Human Rights Watch February 2008