Of modem weapons, none is more ubiquitous and invisible than the land mine, Wars end, but these buried destroyers go on killing and maiming for decades. They are inexpensive weapons, ideal for Third World conflicts, A Chinese antipersonnel mine costs as little as $3; the popular US made Claymore, which can propel 700 steel balls forward in a 60 degree arc and kill at a distance of 50 meters, costs only $27. So secretive are their sale and deployment that nobody really knows where or how many mines remain in the ground.

The US State Department estimates that from 65 million to 110 million land mines infest 62 countries, notably Afghanistan, Cambodia, Angola, Mozambique, El Salvador, the Kurdish areas of Iraq and northern Somalia. This and other disclosures fill a 510 page report by the Arms Project of Human Rights Watch, which makes the case for a total ban on the sale and use of antipersonnel land mines.

 Unfortunately, a total ban will not happen soon, demand is strong, and many arms producing countries compete for the profits that these infernal machines earn, but a total ban is a just goal, and a global campaign is now taking off. Meanwhile, more needs to be done to clear existing mine fields and make a repugnant weapon less enduringly deadly. Like poison gas, land mines made their first appearance in World War |, when Germans buried fused artillery shells to counter allied tank offensives, In the twenties the use of chemical weapons was successfully outlawed, in part because belligerents had a mutual interest in respecting the ban. By contrast, land mines were less obviously horrifying, caster to use than chemical weapons, and had the tactical benefit of forcing tanks into narrow passages that had been swept of mines soon new, light, and easy to handle explosives made possible a demoralizing antipersonnel weapon that could be detonated by a footfall. So great has been the demand that 48 nations now make and sell 340 different models of antipersonnel land mines ideal “eternal sentinels,” always awake, never demanding food or pay, and allowed by the rules of war. Yet antipersonnel mines have killed or maimed more people than chemical, biological and nuclear warfare.

Article extracted from this publication >>  December 17, 1993