page_title: Cluster munition
section_title: History of use
hierarchical_section_title: Cluster munition / History of use
caption_attribution_description: English: A U.S. Navy Grumman A-6E Intruder from attack squadron VA-95 Green Lizards aircraft dropping CBU-59 cluster bombs over Iranian targets in retaliation for the mining of the guided missile frigate USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58) on 18 April 1988. VA-95 was assigned to Carrier Air Wing 11 (CVW-11) aboard the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise (CVN-65) for a deployment to the Western Pacific and the Indian Ocean from 5 January to 3 July 1988.
context_page_description: A cluster munition is a form of air-dropped or ground-launched explosive weapon that releases or ejects smaller submunitions. Commonly, this is a cluster bomb that ejects explosive bomblets that are designed to kill personnel and destroy vehicles. Other cluster munitions are designed to destroy runways or electric power transmission lines, disperse chemical or biological weapons, or to scatter land mines. Some submunition-based weapons can disperse non-munitions, such as leaflets.
  Because cluster bombs release many small bomblets over a wide area, they pose risks to civilians both during attacks and afterwards. Unexploded bomblets can kill or maim civilians and/or unintended targets long after a conflict has ended, and are costly to locate and remove.
  Cluster munitions are prohibited for those nations that ratify the Convention on Cluster Munitions, adopted in Dublin, Ireland in May 2008. The Convention entered into force and became binding international law upon ratifying states on 1 August 2010, six months after being ratified by 30 states. As of 1 April 2018, a total of 120 states have joined the Convention, as 103 States parties and 17 Signatories.
caption: A U.S. Navy Grumman A-6E Intruder drops CBU-59 cluster bombs over Iranian targets in 1988
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