THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | OCTOBER 2023 17 The fireside chat marked the launch of ADST’s new oral history project, an electronic collection of interviews with more than 30 diplomatic leaders, Oral Histories of U.S. Diplomacy in Afghanistan 2001–2021. Supported by philanthropic grants from the Rockefeller Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the project aims to capture valuable firsthand accounts of the U.S. intervention in and withdrawal from Afghanistan. New Munitions for Ukraine Ukraine observed its national day— the second since the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion 18 months earlier— with subdued celebrations on Aug. 24. In a video address marking the occasion, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy thanked Ukrainians for their contributions to the nation’s defense. That defense effort provoked controversy earlier this summer, however, when the U.S. pledged to provide cluster munitions to the Ukrainian counteroffensive to help it overcome its disadvantage in manpower and artillery. That decision was announced by the White House in early July as part of a new $800 million package of military aid to Ukraine. Cluster munitions include rockets, bombs, missiles, and artillery projectiles that break apart midair, scattering smaller bomblets over a large area. They are banned by most NATO members and more than 120 countries— though not the U.S., Russia, or Ukraine— for the harm unexploded ordnance poses to civilians even after a conflict is over. According to The New York Times, since their first use during World War II, these munitions have killed an estimated
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