Obama administration will not sign land mine ban

[Valigarmander]

The Associated Press: Obama administration will not sign land mine ban

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration has decided not to sign an international convention banning land mines.

State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said Tuesday that the administration recently completed a review and decided not to change the Bush-era policy.

"We decided that our land mine policy remains in effect," he said.

More than 150 countries have agreed to the Mine Ban Treaty's provisions to end the production, use, stockpiling and trade in mines. Besides the United States, holdouts include: China, India, Pakistan, Myanmar and Russia.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., criticized the State Department's review of the land mine policy as "cursory and halfhearted."

The senator described the decision to stand fast on the current policy as "a lost opportunity .... The United States took some of the earliest and most effective steps to restrict the use of land mines. We should be leading this effort, not sitting on the sidelines."

Human rights groups had expressed hopes that the Obama administration would sign the treaty.

Stephen Goose, the director of Human Rights Watch's arms division, said he was surprised by the announcement and called it disappointing. He said that his group had been pushing the administration to conduct a review of its policy but that the administration had given no indication that one was under way.

"If one was already completed, it was not very extensive," he said.

Kelly said that the United States would send an observer group of mine experts to a review conference on the treaty in Cartegena, Colombia, next week.

A report this month by the International Campaign to Ban Landmines found that mines remain planted in the earth in more than 70 countries and killed at least 1,266 people and wounded 3,891 last year. More than 2.2 million anti-personnel mines, 250,000 anti-vehicle mines and 17 million other explosives left over from wars have been removed since 1999, the report said.

White House, I am disappoint.

[Bomby]

They say the easiest way to fail is to try to please everyone. That does not mean that the easiest way to succeed is to try to displease everyone.

[Maximum Spider]

Ah, so this is a bad thing, eh?

[Robotazy]

Only because we keep losing our Land Mines.

Then some innocent citizen finds them....with thier foot.

[Cosmonautical]

If we made them easy to locate, that would make them useless. It is a quandery: when should the effects of war no longer affect the citizens of nations at war?

I mean, there's no two ways about it: innocent people get killed by tons of ****, intentional or not. Inhumane? Well, war is inhumane.

[John Galt]

Originally Posted by The Bureau

If we made them easy to locate, that would make them useless. It is a quandery: when should the effects of war no longer affect the citizens of nations at war?

I mean, there's no two ways about it: innocent people get killed by tons of ****, intentional or not. Inhumane? Well, war is inhumane.

Well put.

War doesn't care who it kills.

[Bomby]

War doesn't care about anything because it's an unconscious entity.

[Jere]

Originally Posted by The Bureau

I mean, there's no two ways about it: innocent people get killed by tons of ****, intentional or not. Inhumane? Well, war is inhumane.

The point whit a mine is to hurt your opponents not kill them.

just thought that it would be a good thing to add to the conversation, but then there is exceptions.

[Robotazy]

I thought all weapons were made to kill.

[Lurch1982]

Landmines aren't really designed to kill. They're designed to maim. Its part practicality (slows down troop advancement, sets traps, prevents a mass-charge, etc), part psychological warfare (look into the German S mines, aka the Bouncing Betty, which would basically launch to about crotch-height and explode shrapnel into the victims. It was more likely to blow off legs and genitalia than actually kill someone).

[heh]

goddamnit obama

[CuccoLady]

I r has a disappoint. :{/

[CodenameV]

Although this joke has already been said, I will say it again to reinforce the point. SON, I AM DISAPPOINT

[MeowMan]

Has Obama lost his mind!?

[Cosmonautical]

Originally Posted by Lurch1982

Landmines aren't really designed to kill. They're designed to maim. Its part practicality (slows down troop advancement, sets traps, prevents a mass-charge, etc), part psychological warfare (look into the German S mines, aka the Bouncing Betty, which would basically launch to about crotch-height and explode shrapnel into the victims. It was more likely to blow off legs and genitalia than actually kill someone).

Well, my point wasn't focused around killing so much as observing that there's nothing humanitarian about war in the first place. If the US wants to play world police, their image would certainly benefit from the banning of this kind of thing, but I don't see the use of any kind of weapon as more justifiable than another, really.

[Panfan]

Originally Posted by Bomby

War doesn't care about anything because it's an unconscious entity.

WAR DOESN'T CARE ABOUT BLACK PEOPLE

[Zharen]

[LASER BEAR ASSAULT UNIT]

Typical. Only in a world like this would contraptions that can blow limbs off would be more legal than certain plants.

[Deku Trii]

Originally Posted by CAPS ARE MANLY

Typical. Only in a world like this would contraptions that can blow limbs off would be more legal than certain plants.

Possession of landmines is not more legal than possession of marijuana.

[Booyakasha]

Don't see the point of outlawing one particular form weaponry while leaving all the others on the table.