The Ottawa Landmine Ban: Hardly ‘Historic’

(Washington, D.C.): To judge by the reporting on yesterday’s signing ceremony in Ottawa, the
formal title of the treaty completed there must be “The Historic Landmine Ban.” Since, of course,
that is not the landmine accord’s official appellation, there must be some reason why the media
would incessantly describe this treaty as “historic.”

Bad History Has Already Been Made

The truth of the matter is that other fatally flawed arms control treaties have already established
the high-water marks for fatuousness, unverifiability, unenforceability and ineffectiveness for
which the ban on anti-personnel landmines (APLs) might be said to compete. Consider the
following:

• The ban on anti-personnel landmines is fatuous, but no more so than the idea of banning
  war — the objective of the notorious Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1929. As World War II amply
  demonstrated, this “triumph of hope over experience” did nothing to avert the outbreak of
  hostilities; if anything, the accord contributed to it by reducing Western preparedness for that
  eventuality.
• The ban on anti-personnel landmines is unverifiable, but no more so than the prohibition
  of biological weapons — the objective of the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention. As recent
  events in Iraq have called to mind, this Convention was totally unverifiable.⁽¹⁾ It has also
  proven to be totally irrelevant to ongoing efforts by Saddam Hussein, the rulers of the Kremlin
  and countless other regimes around the world bent on continuing their respective biological
  weapons programs.
• The ban on anti-personnel landmines is unenforceable, but no more so than any previous
  arms control agreement has proven to be. The sorry truth is that even in those circumstances
  where violations of such accords has blatantly occurred — for example, in the case of the
  Soviet Krasnoyarsk radar (a clear-cut breach of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty) or
  Iraq’s use of poison gas against Iran (a manifest contravention of the 1925 Geneva Protocol on
  Chemical Warfare) — there has been no penalty imposed on the perpetrators. In fact, those
  who profess the greatest commitment to arms control are invariably the ones most prone to
  making excuses for the violators and demanding that retribution be avoided, lest the treaty
  regime in question be jeopardized.
• The ban on anti-personnel landmines is ineffective, but no more so than other efforts to
  “stigmatize” or disinvent weapon systems. The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty has not
  prevented the spread of dangerous nuclear technology to non-nuclear weapons states. As
  noted above, the Biological Weapons Convention certainly has not rid the world of biological
  arms. And the new Chemical Weapons Convention has no prospect of creating a world free of
  chemical munitions.

Historically Hyped?

If it is impossible to describe the international landmine ban as “historic” on the basis of its
substance, the only possible claim to a first is no less damning one: Never before has a fatuous,
unverifiable, unenforceable and ineffective arms control treaty come about as a result
almost entirely of public relations hype and non-governmental political activity.

Indeed, the success of the landmine campaigners and their celebrity patrons in bludgeoning
governments who should know better than to sign onto this ban has taken on almost mythic
proportions. It takes nothing away from the organizational skills and zealous determination of the
veteran anti-military activists and other radicals at the core of this campaign to note two factors
that have contributed significantly to this success: 1) the reflexively sympathetic treatment they
received from the press and 2) the use of funds by the International Committee of the Red Cross
(ICRC) — perhaps including those provided by U.S. taxpayers for humanitarian relief — to
underwrite the landmine ban campaign.

CNN’s Contribution: Propaganda

A prime example of the sort of largely uncritical coverage given by the media to the landmine ban
appeared on CNN Tuesday night, the eve of the signing ceremony in Ottawa. This hour-long
“Special Report” amounted to a propaganda film for the treaty, whose champions were
prominently and repeatedly featured amid: heart-wrenching profiles of victims of landmines
coping with their shattered limbs and lives; reports of the Sisyphean difficulties and dangers
entailed in clearing mines (intended as an argument for banning these weapons); and the evidently
obligatory, gauzy images of the campaign’s official martyr, Princess Diana.

Incredibly, nowhere in the course of the hour program was there any discussion of whether
the landmine ban would actually work. The U.S. officials who appeared briefly and
infrequently (certainly relative to the myriad, protracted appearances of Jody Williams, Bobby
Muller and other standard-bearers for the landmine treaty) spoke defensively about American
policy — but not about the fundamental flaw in this agreement: It will not prevent the
production, stockpiling, transfer or use of anti-personnel landmines.

The CNN special also perpetuated a significant misrepresentation of General Norman
Schwarzkopf‘s views on the utility of landmines. In the context of a discussion of the U.S.
position that it must be able to have and use self-deactivating/self-destructing (a.k.a. “smart”)
APLs, Gen. Schwarzkopf was cited as “a supporter of the ban.” In fact, Gen. Schwarzkopf has
publicly stated that he believes the United States must retain the ability to use “smart”
landmines.⁽²⁾

No less accurate is the unchallenged assertion which appeared in the course of the “Special
Report” that not only Gen. Schwarzkopf but also “America’s retired military leadership” want
APLs to be banned. This is simply fraudulent, as evidenced by the successive open letters sent to
President by as many as 24 of the Nation’s most highly respected and highly decorated ground
combat commanders, who strenuously oppose the sort of ban entailed in the Ottawa treaty.⁽³⁾ Not
one of these generals was given a chance to set the record straight.

Finally, only at the very end of the program was the issue raised as to whether the landmine ban
would actually have the pernicious, not to say absurd, effect of diverting resources and energy
away from the real humanitarian problem — that caused by the landmines already in the
ground. The only reference to this danger came from Paul Jefferson, a courageous former
British Army and freelance mine-clearer who was badly injured in the course of de-mining
operations in Kuwait:

“I regard a land mines ban as being unworkable and not addressing the issue. If the
issue one is hoping to address is that of human suffering, the landmine ban has not dealt
with the problem and will not deal with the problem. I believe that the very existence
of a ban represents a displacement activity which always gives people the option
of supporting a ban rather than supporting mine clearance.

“It’s very easy for a government to support a ban; it doesn’t cost them anything.
They can get a lot of mileage from their voting populace and seem to be a caring
government when supporting the landmine ban, but [without] actually addressing
the real problem — which can only really be addressed by clearance.”

The ICRC’s Contribution: Money

Mr. Jefferson’s fears appear especially well-grounded in light of the demonstrable diversion of
resources from humanitarian work — for which the International Committee of the Red Cross is
underwritten by the U.S. and other governments — to advocacy of the present ban and other arms
control initiatives. The ICRC is estimated to have spent $5 million in recent years promoting a
ban on blinding lasers. Its contribution to the landmine campaign is believed to have been on
the order of $30 million.

Given the fungibility of money, it is certainly the case that the United States’ contribution to the
ICRC — on the order of $120 million last year — is indirectly, if not directly, being used for the
purpose of compelling the American government to adopt positions deemed contrary to this
country’s national security interests. This amounts to an unconscionable abuse of U.S. tax-dollars, especially to the extent that those dollars become, on net, unavailable for disaster relief
and other humanitarian endeavors.

Will Mine-Clearing Funds Be Similarly Abused?

In the wake of the Ottawa signing ceremony — and, at least in part, in response to criticism from
mine-clearers like Paul Jefferson — the landmine campaigners have announced that they will now
focus attention on raising billions of dollars from governments for the purpose of underwriting de-mining and caring for the victims of mine incidents. Unfortunately, the past track-record of some
of those involved in this campaign raises a question as to whether, in the absence of rigorous
safeguards (no less rigorous, for example, than those applied to the proceeds of Iraqi oil-for-food
sales), public monies given for a worthy cause will once again be significantly abused.

Will, for example, there be protections put in place to ensure that the ICRC, UN or other NGO
beneficiaries of such largesse will not use part of the proceeds from a de-mining fund to mau-mau
the United States into signing the landmine ban? Just yesterday, in a adulatory profile of Bobby
Muller, the New York Times reported that this prime-mover behind the landmine ban “plans to
have his organization, the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation, out on the congressional
campaign trail next year and in the presidential election to follow, aiming to put public pressure on
Vice President Al Gore and any other political aspirant rated lukewarm on such a globally
populist issue.”⁽⁴⁾ Will this campaign of political influence and intimidation be partially
underwritten unbeknownst to them by U.S. taxpayers?

What is more, will such resources also be available to those who make no secret of their intention
to mount further, dubious arms control campaigns, modeled upon the landmine ban? Will, for
example, U.S. tax-dollars next be used to prohibit anti-tank landmines (which Gen. Schwarzkopf
and most other retired military leaders recognize are indispensable to the U.S. military), fuel-air
explosives, depleted-uranium rounds, non-lethal weapons and, ultimately, nuclear arms?

As the Center observed on 2 December, Canadian Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy, the principal
governmental sponsor of the landmine ban, has already announced his intention to pursue
aggressively a ban on small caliber munitions.⁽⁵⁾ Is it possible that such a scheme will be the next
one forced down the throat of the American military with the help of U.S. financial
contributions? To add to the ignominy, will those contributions be taken out of the Pentagon’s
budget on the theory that mine-clearance is, after all, a military mission?

The Bottom Line

Those who have brought us the landmine ban have declared their intention, if it is impossible to
ban war, then to make it “impossible to fight” by dint of an array of treaties banning one class of
weaponry after another. The implicit assumption that such weapons can be disinvented is
indefensible. The reality that nations which have repeatedly shown themselves willing to sign onto
treaties then violate them makes such a policy irresponsible. And the prospect that U.S. tax
resources might be utilized to advance this agenda is nothing short of scandalous.

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1. Efforts now underway to “improve” the BWC’s verifiability cannot correct its shortcomings on
this score. They will, however, likely add significantly to the costs to U.S. pharmaceutical and
other biotech firms by exposing them to what amounts to government-sanctioned economic
espionage.

2. See the Center’s Decision Brief entitled New Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Draws
Line in the Sand: No Exceptions, No Military ‘Chop’ on Landmine Ban (No. 97-D 136, 16
September 1997).

3. See the following Center products: Celestial Navigation: Pentagon’s Extraordinary ’64-Star’
Letter Shows Why The U.S. Cannot Agree to Ban All Landmines (No. 97-D 97, 14 July 1997)
and Many of Nation’s Most Respected Military Leaders Join Forces to Oppose Bans On Use
of Self-Destructing Landmines (No. 97-P 101, 21 July 1997).

4. Francis X. Clines, “28-Year Quest to Abolish Land Mines Pays Off for Veteran, Who Fights
On,” New York Times, 3 December 1997.

5. See the Center’s Decision Brief entitled ‘Let Us Count the Ways’ the Landmine Ban Would
Disserve U.S. Interests (No. 97-D 184, 2 December 1997).