A top House Republican said Sunday he agreed with the Biden administration's contentious decision to supply cluster munitions to Ukraine as part of a new military aid package, while a prominent progressive Democrat said the US risks "losing our moral leadership" over the move.
House Foreign Affairs Chairman Michael McCaul, a Texas Republican, and Rep. Barbara Lee, a California Democrat, made their remarks in separate interviews with CNN's Jake Tapper on "State of the Union."
McCaul said the weapons "would be a game-changer" in the war in Ukraine, noting that "Russia is dropping with impunity cluster bombs" on Ukrainian territory.
"All the Ukrainians and (President Volodymyr) Zelensky are asking for is to give them the same weapons the Russians have to use in their own country against Russians who are in their own country," he said. "They do not want these to be used in Russia."
The munitions, also known as cluster bombs, spread shrapnel that is designed to kill troops or take out armored vehicles such as tanks, but they also scatter "bomblets" across large areas that can fail to explode on impact and can pose a long-term risk to anyone who encounters them, similar to landmines.
Over 100 countries, including the UK, France and Germany, have outlawed the munitions under the Convention on Cluster Munitions, but the US and Ukraine are not signatories to the ban -- a point that McCaul emphasized on Sunday.
CNN previously reported that President Joe Biden mulled over the decision before approving the weapons transfer on Friday.
Biden said in an interview with CNN's Fareed Zakaria that it was a "difficult decision" but he was ultimately convinced to send the controversial weapons because Kyiv needs ammunition in its counteroffensive against Russia.
Lee, however, told CNN that cluster bombs "should never be used. That's crossing a line."
"They don't always immediately explode. Children can step on them," she said. "The president's been doing a good job managing this war, this Putin aggressive war against Ukraine. But I think that this should not happen."
Asked by Tapper if the US could be engaging in war crimes by providing the weaponry, Lee said, "What I think is that we ... would risk losing our moral leadership because, when you look at the fact that over 120 countries have signed the convention on cluster munitions saying that they should never be used, they should never be used."
The remarks underscore the sensitivity surrounding cluster munitions, which US forces began phasing out in 2016 because of the danger they pose to civilians.
