The question has a semantic problem; on the one hand it may very well be a useful military application -- on the other hand from a moral perspective, the use of cluster-bombs is (seemingly) no different than nuclear or chemical weapons (and occasionally land mines) except for scope.
I believe that morality should always trump -- and that in the fight to win the "hearts and minds" of others, this would be a more significant blow than any cluster bomb.

I believe these nations should giveup using these kind of bombs when the Islamic terrorist and the nations and people who harbor them also agree to stop killing innocent civilian to prove their own point of view.

That is a very shallow point of view. In the old days before Bush, when the US was still respected, we would take the high road and be the example in showing how to live peacefully. You cannot wait for the lowest and basest elements of society to meet certain conditions before giving up BARBARIC and outmoded ways of combat.

Land mines, cluster bombs, gas warfare, beheading, etc, are all things that methods of warfare that should not even be in our arsenal any more.

We didn't use torture on our enemies either, until Bush decided it was OK. It's time we joined the rest of the civilized Western nations and stopped acting like 3rd world dictatorships!

This is the kind of thing that makes me embarrassed to be an American. We consistently allow policies that are in flagrant disregard for humanity. There is no acceptable excuse for these cluster bombs and no reason that our society should agree to allowing our government to use them. They are not necessary, not safe, don't serve to protect our troops or deter the "terrorist". It's disgusting. It makes me sick to my stomach that our "representation" doesn't support the kind of treaties, concepts, or progress that has the best interests of it's people or people in general. I am, however, glad that's in the news. I hope it stays there long enough for the people to get outraged enough to push the changes necessary in government so that they start to follow the shift in it's own peoples paradigm, which I believe to be much, much more humane.

Should we also ban bullets because they are also indiscriminate? Many cluster bombs are detonate on impact weapons and therefore irrelavant. The others are used to spread landmines which is something the US has already said it will not ban.
As far as the "Daisy Cutter" comment. This is pure ignorance. The term was coined due to the fact that the weapon when employed as designed cut down trees with the ease of daisys. This so-called "devistating" weapon was designed to create helicopter landing zones for troops and supplies during the Vietnam Conflict.
More liberal British propaganda infiltrating the US in the form of education.

KILLING INNOCENTS has been something the US has always very good at-the way to kill has never been a problem for the US-especially with this administration-this administration has probally killed moe people that any other in the history of our country-I do not know this for a fact but this administration has probably killed and wounded more people than WWII-we refuse to talk to our enemies -INNOCENTS will be killed or wounded for the next 100 years based on the cluster bombs we drop today-suppose for a moment that cluster bombs were dropped on us-you would be afraid to go walking or running or driving-you would be afraid to dig in the sand-climb a mountain-walk in a forrest-dig up a hole in the street-plant trees plant flowers-the mindset of our population would be so negative that smiles and laughter would become a thing of the past-there would be elemetry school classes devoted to cluster bombs -when classes are taught concerning cluster bombs there would never be classes taught about trees and flowers-
Rembrandt Moss

Of course. There are no good weapons, only useful ones. If the Bush Administration and the U.S. military think that cluster bombs are a useful weapon to possess they should at least tell the world why they believe that, and not just in vague terms like "military necessity." They should have to make a case in the court of nations about the fears they have that necessitate the use of cluster bombs and be prepared to answer follow-up questions.

I lay at Congress's feet much of the government's reluctance to sign on to this agreement. Congress has dragged its feet on accessing to most of the humanitarian treaties we've signed for decades. They seem to be convinced that the U.S. has this special status that makes it above reproach and not subject to any external law enforcement (although it did sign away economic rights to the World Trade Federation).

This cavalier attitude stems from the way Congress has long viewed itself as immune from the laws it passes for the rest of us, such as anti-discrimination statutes, conflict-of-interest regulations and financial disclosure rules. Add to that the Bush regime's redefinitions of torture and violations of the Geneva Conventions and you have a ruling class that exploits, maims, kills, profiteers and gets re-elected with impunity. Why should they submit to foreign bodies breathing down their necks?

Nobody can make them do it unless almost everybody does.

Should we sign the treaty? Absolutely not!
The fact that nations without the capability to employ a weapon have agreed not to do so is meaningless.

Unexploded ordnance is, and always has been a danger to personnel who pass through an area after it has been struck, which has little to do with the size of that ordnance. Should the reliability of the ordnance be improved so that a greater portion of the charges explode at the appropriate time? Certainly, there is no advantage to not doing so. The consideration of appropriate weapon employment is a tactical decision and should be made by the field commanders who are trained to do so, not by those of us debating the issue at home.

The munitions are designed to destroy and kill. I would ask those who claim that there is no legitimate military purpose to these weapons why they believe killing the enemy and destroying his equipment to be illegitimate?

To those who think bomb is a better word than munition, I offer these dictionary entries:

munition noun 1. weapons considered collectively

bomb noun 1. Military. a projectile, formerly usually spherical, filled with a bursting charge and exploded by means of a fuze, by impact, or otherwise, now generally designed to be dropped from an aircraft.

Plese note that there are munitions which utilize the cluster principle that are not bombs (being missiles or artillery shells instead). The differentiation of terminology is one of specificity and accuracy rather than one of emotional anesthetization.

Nah! The USA should develop them further so that the explosive component has a very short shelf life so as to render it inert after a short time, something like 24 hours. Wars are inevitable and weapons like cluster bombs are very useful and cost effective. Unfortunately, children get killed scavenging for scraps in the areas where they've been used. Restricted use of the deployment is not practical because there's no legalese that could adequately cover the circumstances in which deployment could be restricted without challenge after challenge. I would say that in general, the US military does more to prevent killing of innocents and does more to protect noncombatants than any opponent it's faced.

no the us should not, it seams that most of the people who want to ban these things are the same ones who would probably give away our country, if these people were on the ground in combat i think that they would change there minds really quick

WHAT! Give away our country? To whom? Just because people don't want war and believe somehow that banning weapons might stop wars, it doesn't mean they want to give up their country or nationality. The problem with cluster munitions is that they often kill non combtants because of unexploded munitions, just like mine fields that are never cleared after conflicts end.
But I digress. Who would these folks give the country away to? Foreigners or corporations or...? Just wondering.

of course, but we're too bloody-minded and too scared to do so

Yes!

During a trip to Southeast Asia a mere two years ago, I read a small item in the English language newspaper in Vietnam about three children-- one killed, one blinded and maimed, and a third maimed-- who found a bomblet and started playing with it, (thinking it was a ball), and it detonated. More than 35 years later, you have leftover UXO (unexploded ordnance) from the American-Vietnam war, killing literally hundreds of innocent people per year-- TODAY. The war is long over, but the fatalities are not. Most casualties are borne by farmers and by children. In fact, our veterans, through the Vietnam Veteran Memorial Fund, recognized the crisis and started a program called Project RENEW to help do public education (focused on children), to locate and clear cluster bombs, mines, and other leftover ordinance in the former DMZ. These dangerous weapons are too numerous to locate and clear within our lifetime, and the process is extremely expensive and dangerous.
The children who face maiming and death today are two generations distant from that war-- most have never even heard of it, and only know Americans as friends. And so we are, aren't we? There is no legal weapon we should use that could possibly kill the innocent great-grandchildren of our enemies today-- not if we are sincere about spreading democracy, stability and future peace.

It has been demonstrated that cluster bombs do not function properly 100% of the time. This leaves what essentially functions as a landmine. The moral issue associated with landmines is the fact that those without remote sensors or timers remain indiscriminate killers as long as they remain undetonated. Although the US never became signatories to the super popular Ottawa land mine treaty, (neither did Israel, Russia, some other producers) we did voluntarily discontinue production, (at least overtly) in response to pressure from the world community. Similar pressure should be exerted on the pentagon now with regard to cluster bombs, (Or was showing a similar weapon in Iron Man enough pressure?) That way, it won't matter whether we sign or not, we will voluntarily agree to discontinue production.