Date |
Location |
Details |
1943 |
USSR |
Soviet forces use air-dropped cluster munitions against German armor. German forces use SD-1 and SD-2 butterfly bombs against artillery on the Kursk salient. |
1943 |
United Kingdom |
German aircraft drop more than 1,000 SD-2 butterfly bombs on the port of Grimsby. |
1960s-1970s |
Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam |
US forces make extensive use of cluster munitions in bombing campaigns. The ICRC estimates that in Laos alone, nine to 27 million unexploded submunitions remain, and some 11,000 people have been killed or injured, more than 30 percent of them children. An estimate based on US military databases states that 9,500 sorties in Cambodia delivered up to 87,000 air-dropped cluster munitions. |
1973 |
Syria |
Israel uses air-dropped cluster munitions against non-state armed group (NSAG) training camps near Damascus. |
1975-1988 |
Western Sahara |
Moroccan forces use cluster munitions against NSAG. |
1978 |
Lebanon |
Israel uses cluster munitions in southern Lebanon. |
1979-1989 |
Afghanistan |
Soviet forces make use of air-dropped and rocket-delivered cluster munitions. NSAG also use rocket-delivered cluster munitions on a smaller scale. |
1982 |
Lebanon |
Israel uses cluster munitions against Syrian forces and NSAG in Lebanon. |
1982 |
Falkland Islands (Malvinas) |
UK aircraft drop cluster munitions on Argentinean infantry positions near Port Stanley, Port Howard, and Goose Green. |
1986 |
Chad |
French aircraft drop cluster munitions on a Libyan airfield at Wadi Doum. |
1991 |
Iraq, Kuwait,
Saudi Arabia |
The US and its allies (France, Saudi Arabia, UK) drop 61,000 cluster bombs containing some 20 million submunitions. The number of cluster munitions delivered by surface-launched artillery and rocket systems during the Gulf War is not known, but an estimated 30 million or more DPICM submunitions were used in the conflict. |
1992-1995 |
Bosnia- Herzegovina |
Forces of Yugoslavia and NSAG use available stocks of cluster munitions during civil war. |
1992-1997 |
Tajikistan |
Use by unknown forces in civil war. |
1994-1996 |
Chechnya |
Russian forces use cluster munitions against NSAG. |
1995 |
Croatia |
On May 2-3, 1995, an NSAG uses Orkan M-87 multiple rocket launchers to attack civilians in Zagreb. Additionally, the Croatian government claimed that Serb forces used BL-755 bombs in Sisak, Kutina, and along the Kupa River. |
1996-1999 |
Sudan |
Sudanese government forces use air-dropped cluster munitions in southern Sudan. |
1997 |
Sierra Leone |
Nigerian ECOMOG peacekeepers use Beluga bombs on the eastern town of Kenema. |
1998 |
Ethiopia / Eritrea |
Ethiopia and Eritrea exchange aerial cluster munition strikes, Ethiopia attacking the Asmara airport and Eritrea attacking the Mekele airport. Ethiopia also dropped BL-755 bombs in Gash-Barka province of western Eritrea. |
1998-1999 |
Albania |
Yugoslav forces launch cross-border rocket attacks and NATO forces carry out six aerial cluster munition strikes. |
1999 |
Yugoslavia (including Serbia, Montenegro, and Kosovo) |
The US, UK, and Netherlands drop 1,765 cluster bombs, containing 295,000 bomblets. |
2001- 2002 |
Afghanistan |
The US drops 1,228 cluster bombs containing 248,056 bomblets. |
2003 |
Iraq |
The US and UK use nearly 13,000 cluster munitions containing an estimated 1.8 to 2 million submunitions in the three weeks of major combat. |
2006 |
Lebanon |
Israeli forces use surface-launched and air-dropped cluster munitions against Hezbollah. The UN estimates that Israel used up to 4 million submunitions. |
2006 |
Israel |
Hezbollah fires more than 100 Chinese-produced Type-81 122mm cluster munition rockets into northern Israel. |