Anti-personnel landmines: a modern day scourge.

• Author: Faulkner, Frank

Frank Faulkner comments on the dilemmas of security and development and points to the enormous human cost of a pernicious weapon.

In an uncertain world, characterised by the lack of any central, governing body, the global trade in armaments continues to impact heavily upon attempts to establish durable development and security regimes. Arms expenditures, despite declining from a peak approaching US$1000 billion in the late 1980s,(1) still divert huge amounts of global wealth for military purposes -- an estimated US$744 billion for the year 1995.To consider the developing countries' share of this total, they are estimated to have spent US$114 billion on defence-related materiel during this period.(2) Significantly, approximately 800 million people in developing countries suffer malnourishment to some degree, and about one-third of the total population, or 1.3 billion people, live in absolute poverty.(3)

The worldwide preoccupation with militarism is perhaps no better exemplified than by the trade in antipersonnel landmines. Since the onset of the Second World War, more than 400 million anti-personnel mines have been sown, of which an estimated 65 million plus have been deployed since the 1980 Convention on Conventional Weapons. Conservative estimates suggest that there are 110 million landmines currently infesting 64 countries, mostly in the developing world, with approximately 100 million stockpiled and awaiting future use.(4) The problem grows progressively more acute with between two and five million more landmines being deployed annually.(5)

Whilst the sheer scale of global landmine proliferation alone is the subject of some disquiet, the statistics reveal the proportions of a humanitarian catastrophe when casualty figures are introduced. Up to 1995, there were at least 250,000 landmine-disabled persons in the world; the number of reported landmine-related incidents reveal that there are roughly 26,000 new victims each year.(6) Of these victims, the majority are unarmed civilians, including significant numbers of children.(7) Landmines as a weapons system are, arguably, unique; with every other armaments type available in the military inventory target selection allowing discrimination between soldiers and civilians is standard practice. Landmines, however, are incapable of making such choices, primarily because once deployed, they are effectively divorced from any human agency, and will inflict death or serious injury, irrespective of military or non-combatant status.

Serious inhibition

Over and above issues of discrimination, these devices also seriously inhibit an affected country's ability to recover from the ravages of war; this particularly applies to the civil wars or counter-insurgency operations which account for most modern conflicts, and which are typified by a lack of standard military discipline usually associated with fully professional, national armed forces. In far too many of these instances, landmines stay in the ground long after a cessation of hostilities. To put this problem into proper perspective, Russia still mounts annual mine-eradication exercises during the spring and summer, to clear ordnance laid by the Germans during the Second World War; in Laos, farmers and their families are still being killed by landmines scattered by US aeroplanes twenty-five years ago.(8)

Landmines fit into two categories -- anti-tank and anti-personnel-but this article will focus on the latter, of which there are three distinct types:

* Blast Mines. The most common type of mine they operate by means of a pressure-actuated plate that directs explosive-initiated energy towards the target. The effects of the blast are usually accompanied by fragments of the mine casing and surrounding debris, parts of the the victim's footwear and bone shards, which often exacerbate the injury. Fragmentation, however, is usually a secondary feature of this type of device, as the target invariably initiates detonation by direct contact.

* Fragmentation/bounding mines. With this type of weapon, the effect is reversed: the blast is employed to shatter the mine casing, the objective of which is to hurl shrapnel and pre-formed metal objects over as wide an area as possible. Several models of this type are tripwire-activated, and mounted on stakes above ground level to maximise effect. To achieve greater lethality, many mines feature serrated casings or pre-cut razor wire. Bounding mines, which rely mostly on a fragmentation effect, have a cylindrical body usually mounted in a short pot, or barrel assembly. Activation detonates an explosive charge which forces the mine body upwards, usually to about a metre above ground; at this juncture, an anchor cable secured to the barrel ejects a pin from the fuse on the body. The main charge then detonates, showering fragments at ballistic speed over a wide radius -- much more so than with a buried, or surface mine.

* Directional mines. As with the above, this type of mine, often referred to as a `Claymore', employs the fragmentation method. Directional mines propel pre-configured metal pieces over a set arc to maximise lethality; these weapons have been described as the military equivalent of the sawn-off shotgun.

Post-conflict priorities

In any given post-conflict situation, priorities include: reviving decimated economies; maintaining an efficient healthcare apparatus; attending to the diverse societal requirements of the population, and providing for the needs of repatriated refugees and displaced persons. None of the preceding objectives can, of course, be achieved without the establishment of a workable and comprehensive security regime, which provides for individual needs through to the national interest. Before examining security and development issues in greater depth, it will be worthwhile, at this juncture, to analyze the military efficacy of anti-personnel landmines and the rationale behind their continued deployment.

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