The International Struggle to Ban Antipersonnel Landmines:
Every day people all around the world fall victim to antipersonnel mines. AP mines were first used on a wide scale in World War II. AP mines were initially used as a defensive tool, to protect areas such as borders, camps, important bridges, and to restrict the movement of enemy forces. They were designed to maim rather than kill. AP mines do not recognize ceasefires and claim lives long after the end of conflicts. Today, the United States is one of 39 other countries who have not signed the Mine Ban Treaty of 1997, also known as the Ottawa Convention. The treaty is the product of an unusually cohesive and strategic partnership between non-government organizations, international organization, United Nations agencies and governments to ban the use of mines due to key arguments. The current policy held by the U.S government is that “the United States will not join the Ottawa Convention because its terms would have required us to give up a needed military capability…. Landmines still have a valid and essential role protecting United States forces in military operations.… No other weapon currently exists that provides all the capabilities provided by landmines” (United States). The United States should join the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty along with all the other 157 countries who have determined that AP mines hold no military value, cause high death tolls and effect economic growth.
The military’s argument for the use of AP mines is weak and do not offer any strategic military advantage. In an interview conducted by Stephens Rosenfeld, writer for The Washington Post, former US Marine Corps Commandant Alfred Gray made the point even more strongly ‘‘I know of no situation in the Korean War, nor in the five years I served in Southeast Asia, nor in Panama, nor Desert Shield-Desert Storm where our use of mine warfare truly channelized the enemy and brought him into a destructive pattern. I’m not aware of any...