Part 4. Weapons. Weapons are the main tools of your profession. It is therefore important for combatants and their commanders to be thoroughly conversant with the provisions governing their use. When you plan an attack, you cannot assess the risk of incidental or collateral damage unless you are familiar with the weapons or weapons system which will be employed. EXPLOSIVE BULLETS Exploding bullets weighing less than 400 g are regularly used against material and other hard surface objects. The 1868 St Petersburg Declaration prohibits the use of any projectile weighing less than 400 g and which is either explosive or charged with fulminating or inflammable substances. The Declaration states that such projectiles “would uselessly aggravate the suffering of disabled men or render their death inevitable”. This ban does not prevent the use of tracer rounds for spotting or range finding, even when mixed with normal bullets EXPANDING BULLETS The Hague Declaration of 1899 banned the use of expanding bullets, which are also commonly known as “dumdum” bullets. These are bullets that expand or flatten easily in the human body, causing massive and often fatal wounds. 125