Journal of Conventional Weapons Destruction

Volume 5 Issue 1 The Journal of Mine Action Article 4

April 2001

Munitions and Mines: Peace Education for Laos

Titus Peachey Mennonite Central Committee

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Recommended Citation Peachey, Titus (2001) "Munitions and Mines: Peace Education for Laos," Journal of Mine Action : Vol. 5 : Iss. 1 , Article 4. Available at: https://commons.lib.jmu.edu/cisr-journal/vol5/iss1/4

This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Center for International Stabilization and Recovery at JMU Scholarly Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of Conventional Weapons Destruction by an authorized editor of JMU Scholarly Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Peachey: Munitions and Mines: Peace Education for Laos

with Thong Dee, who was plowing his Munitions and Mines: field in Lek Village, illustrates this attitude. When I asked Thong if any Peace Education for Laos bomblets had been turned up during the plowing thus far, he matter-of­ From the end of the Vietnam War to 1994, 10,000 Laotians fell casualty to the factly replied that over 20 had been plowed up the previous day. He had millions of pieces of UXO within their borders. The author recounts the role of thrown or placed some of the bomblets Mennonite Central Commitee and other NGOs in reversing this situation. into a hole at the edge of the plowed field. As I walked over to the hole and peered over the edge, Thong hurriedly pulled away the weeds and scrap metal By Titus Peachey, Mennonite Central Committee This equals roughly one mission for every five inhabitants he had placed on top to reveal the four of the country and an average of one bombing mission or five bomblets underneath. Noticing t was 8:00 one morning in March of 1998, when Phou every eight minutes around rhe clock during the entire that I was about to take a picture, he Vieng, a villager in the northern Lao province ofXieng nine years. Researchers estimate that approximately 90 quickly moved each bomblet into I Khouang, was preparing his work for the day. Having million submunitions were dropped during the bombing clearer view, handling them like they recently built a simple house for his family, his first task campaign. With a dud rare of I 0-30 percent, well over 9 were merely billiard balls. for the morning was to dig several shallow holes in the million pieces of UXO were left behind. This ordnance, Sadly, not everyone was as lucky earthen floor to anchor his bed. After measuring and much of it cluster munitions, has now lain in the ground as Thong Dee. Between the end of the marking the places where his bedposts would lodge, he for over 25 years and becomes less stable and more war in 1975 and the beginning of prepared his digging tool and squarred beside the first mark. dangerous with each passing year. clearance operations in 1994, more In one short stroke, his life was forever changed. When the war ended, hundreds of thousands of Lao than l 0,000 Lao villagers suffered AJl Phou Vieng can remember is the sound of the ex­ villagers who had fled the bombing returned to their homes. • Mrs. Chao and injury or death from UXO. In many plosion. Hundreds of shards of steel tore into his body In most cases, everything had been destroyed. They had to surviving children. ways, the stories are remarkably similar almost irresistible to children. In fact, noticed a round object in the ditch. It c/oMCCU.S. from a cluster bomb buried just beneath the soil. One of rebuild their homes, repair the paddy dikes in their rice to the stories of accidents from over 25 percent of UXO-related looked like the ball boys and girls toss the pieces ofshrapnel punctured a nearby can of gasoline, fields, and open up the soil with shovels and hoes. They landmines. People are injured or killed casualties happen to children, none of to each other during Hmong New Year and it burst into flames. Fortunately, neighbors gathered carried on this imensive work in the midst of a staggering • Phonsavanh, the during their everyday activities such whom were born when the bombs fell. festivities. It was actually a cluster quickly and carried Phou Vieng to safety, but his house array of still-lethal UXO littering the soil. Unknown to capital of Xieng as collecting firewood, herding carrie On Nov. 22, 1993, four Tu Va Chao bomb. Sia Ya threw it to her brother. and all the family's belongings were burned. them, their villages and surrounding fields had become Khouang or hoeing in their fields and gardens. children were walking along a street He couldn't catch it and it landed province, is The bomblet in Phou Vieng's house was dropped as one vast, unmarked mine field. With no one to help them, Because of their curious shapes on the edge of Phonsavanh, Xieng behind him, exploding and killing him situated on a high part of a massive U.S. bombing campaign that flew more these villagers were trapped. In 1994, I asked one villager rolling plateau. and colors, and because many of them Khouang province's capital. They were instantly. Sia Ya died after two than 580,000 missions over Laos between 1964 and 1973. why he cominued to grow vegetables in a location with c/oMCCU.S. can be found easily accessible on top raking rhe water buffalo to pasture agonizing days and nights in the bomblets, or "bombies" as they are often called. He of the soil, cluster munitions are when Kou Ya, four, and Sia Ya, six, provincial hospital. responded, "I can't move my garden. There wouldn't be The story of the Chao children any point to it anyway. Ifi moved it ro a new location, I'd illustrates yet another tragic aspect of just find more bombies there. So I might as well keep it cluster bomb explosions. Compared to where it is." land mines, cluster bombs have higher Thongsavanh, a reacher in Xieng Khouang province explosive power and deadly frag­ during the war years, remembers instructing his students mentation effects. They are designed ro pick up the strange round pieces of ordnance that to kill. In Laos, 52 percent of all UXO appeared in the forests and hillsides near his school. "I didn't accidents have resulted in death. know it was dangerous," he recalled. "I thought since the In the period immediately after bombies hadn't blown up on impact they weren't dangerous the war, the Soviet Union assisted with anymore." the clearance of a large state farm in Typically, when villagers found ordnance in their fields Xieng Khouang province. Aside from and gardens, they simply removed it with their bare hands. this effort, rhe only assistance came They found within themselves a courage borne out of from two North American NGOs: the necessity. Farming was their livelihood and the only land available to them was filled with bombs. Indeed, with the passage of time, villagers became almost casual in their • Bomb craters in Xieng Khaouang approach to the ever-present bomb lets. An encounter I had province. c/o MCC U.S.

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became available, the project grew. only begin to create tiny islands of nine bomblets that had been found on had experienced painful losses from MCC has joined other agencies From 1996-1998, over 122,000 pieces safety in a great sea of ordnance. a hillside used for grazing cattle. As cluster munitions without asking the in issuing a Call for a Moratorium on of UXO were cleared; approximately MAG and its counterpartS in the the team worked, my colleagues and I larger questions about why and how the production and use of cluster 50-75 percent of UXO cleared were Lao government responded quickly to spotted four more bomblets on the cluster munitions are used. As we munitions. As a result of our work in cluster bombs. 1 By the year 2000, this action by the villagers. Rather than hillside. The metal shells of the researched the continued production Laos and our exposure to the UXO eight international partners, in putting all their resources into the sub­ bomblets had just begun to appear and use of cluster munitions in problem on the civilian population in cooperation with the Lao government surface clearance of a piece of land, above the soil. This area had been numerous conflicts around the globe, post-war Iraq and Kosovo, MCC and local partners, were clearing UXO which would take months to clear, cleared before and will certainly have we became convinced that serious believes it is time for the international in nine of the country's 18 provinces they split the team in two. One team to be cleared again. problems exist related to targeting, the community to ban these weapons. • and educating local people to the remained to clear the site of the future April 2001 will mark the seventh size of cluster bomb footprints and • Mines Advisory dangers of UXO. school, while the other team traveled anniversary of the beginning of dud rates. Group technician As MAG began working in Xieng from village to village to destroy systematic UXO clearance in Laos. • U.S. bomb on searching for Khouang province, Laos, the newly bomblets on the surface posing an Tremendous progress has been made UXO. display in front c/oMCCU.S. trained clearance teams encountered immediate threat to life and safety. since the first team of 20 clearance of a home in a curious problem. Each morning, Roving teams continue to destroy specialists was trained in 1994. Phonsavanh, Mennonite Central Committee when they arrived at the work site they bomblets on the surface but do not Hopefu lly, all the destroyed ordnance Xieng Khouang. (MCC) and the American Friends discovered, resting on top of the soil, make the ground safe for agricultural has resulted in some reduced risk and c!oMCCU.S. Service Committee. These groups new cluster bombs that had not been use. The benefit of a roving team is some tragedies have been avoided. It imported good-quality shovels for there the day before. The work site was the immediate reduction in risk, is gratifYing to see these developments. agricultural use. Shovels were thought a large open area that was the future especially to children who are often Despite all this work, there has to be somewhat safer to use than the site of a teacher's training college. A attracted to the toy-like appearance of been linle reduction in the rates of traditional Lao hoe, which was swung conversation with the villagers across bomblets. Over a period of time, inj ury and death. Casualties still occur from high over the head to turn the the road from the worksite cleared up however, the Lao roving teams at the rate of about one accident every Contact Information soil. Shovels were gentler and perhaps the mystery. discovered that they could be called two days. As the Lao population grows Over the past 35 years, in places like Viemam, Laos, Cambodia, Sudan, less likely to detonate a hidden It seems the villagers, who were back to the same area repeatedly. and the pressure on the land increases, Titus Peachey bombler. There were other experi­ aware that cluster bombs were being Bomblets that bury themselves on new areas will have to be opened up Yugoslavia, Iraq, Kuwait, Kosovo, Director of Peace Education ments in these early years, such as an destroyed each day, decided to carry impact often work their way to the for agricultural production and Chechnya, Eritrea, Ethiopia and Mennonite Central Committee MCC-supplied armored tractor with cluster bombs from their village to the surface as time passes. Through the settlement. Much of this land will Afghanistan, cluster munitions have 21 S. 12'h St., Box 500 a chain flail device on the front. These clearance site each evening. In this way, natural expansion and contraction of present a serious UXO problem. had a persistent and tragic record of Akron, PA 17501 experiments proved ineffective and the bomblets from their village could the soil and erosion, new bomblets Ordnance clearance work will have to indiscriminate killing. During Tel: (717) 859-3889 were eventually abandoned. be destroyed, even though their village appear where none could be seen continue in Laos for decades. Operation Desert Storm, at least 25 E-mail: [email protected] H owever, in 1994 the MCC, the had not been chosen for clearance. before. MCC's 25 years of history in Laos U.S. military personnel were killed by Website: http://www.mcc.org/ Mines Advisory Group (MAG) and This action by the villagers, while In May 2000, I accompanied a and ongoing struggle with the U.S. submunitions, and other U.S. clusterbomb the Lao government initiated a UXO extremely risky, also made a clear film crew to Laos to help produce a problem of UXO has led it into the personnel were injured. Cluster clearance project. The project quickly statement about the presence ofUXO documentary that will be shown on arena of advocacy. As a people of faith munitions are an increasingly drew the attention of U.N. agencies in the vast affected areas of Laos. UXO public television. I watched as a bomb committed to peace and non-violence, significant o bstacle in various and other governments. As funding is everywhere, and clearance teams can clearance team prepared to blow up we could not visi t with families who peacekeeping operations.

WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A LANDMIN E AND A CLUSTER MUNITION?

Cl uster munitions are sma ll can easily create kill zones of a tion features which ca n send hun­ The primary difference between Landmines are designed to explode as Cluster m unitions which fail to bomblets or submunitions which are square kilometer or greater in size. dreds of shards of steel at ballist ic cluster munitions and landmines is a result of contact with or proximiry explode on impact, however, are very delivered to their targets in large speeds over a wide area. Anti-armor in their design. ro a person. By design, their effects similar in effect to landmines. containers or shells. The container The bomblets may be the size and bombs have shaped charges which may be felt many months after their opens in mid-airoverthe ta rget area, shape of a lawn dart, or an elon­ can penetrate heavy armor. The Cluster munitions are designed to placement, depending on when a Since dud rates for cluster munitions often dispersing the bomblets over gated soda can, and are designed to cluster munitions are delivered in a explode as a result of their impact, person initiates contact with the are often in the 10 percen r-30 an area the size of several football explode on or shortly after impact. bomb by ai rcraft, or launched by so that their effect is felt within a landmine. percent range, most cluster fields. A drop of several cannisters The AP bomblets have fragmenta- rocket or artillery projectile. short rime of thei r delivery. munition strikes create the actual effect of a mine field .

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