Contemporary landmine technology

Contemporary landmine technology and the resurgence of their use represent one of the more bitter ironies of modern warfare: improvements intended to make weapons more discriminating, or to reduce long-term harm, have not removed the humanitarian catastrophe that landmines inflict. Instead a combination of evolving munition designs, the wider availability of delivery systems and changing strategic calculations has produced both an increase in the deployment of mines in recent conflicts and a durable legacy of contamination that will shape post-conflict recovery for decades.

The landscape of modern mines

Landmines are no longer the crude, purely mechanical devices of the mid-twentieth century. The contemporary arsenal comprises a range of munitions: traditional victim-activated anti-personnel mines, larger anti-vehicle mines, scatterable or artillery-delivered submunitions, directional or off-route mines designed to strike the side of a vehicle, and a widening class of sensor-fuzed munitions that combine sensors, microelectronics and timed or programmable fuzes. Militaries have experimented with “non-persistent” designs intended to self-destruct or self-deactivate after a programmed interval; similarly, some systems incorporate anti-handling features or selective sensors aimed at reducing unintended detonations. But the reality on the ground is more complex: self-destruct mechanisms fail, sensors misidentify benign stimuli, and the objects that remain unpredictable in peacetime are as lethal to civilians and sappers as ever. 

Drivers of renewed use

Several forces explain the recent increase in mine use. First, strategic necessity in certain theatres has seen landmines revalued as area denial tools: they slow and channel enemy movement, protect flanks and complicate assaults. Second, the proliferation of capable delivery systems — artillery, mortars, aircraft, and remotely delivered scatterable systems — allows combatants to emplace barrier systems rapidly and at scale without the logistical footprint of manual planting. Third, the breakdown or deliberate rejection of the international norms established by the Mine Ban Treaty has lowered the political cost for some states. In 2024–2025 a number of European states and other parties signalled or enacted withdrawals or changes to their commitments to the Mine Ban Treaty, citing acute security concerns; such political shifts have materially affected the international consensus against anti-personnel mines. 

Human cost and scale

The human toll is immediate and long-lasting. The International Campaign to Ban Landmines and its Landmine Monitor reported a worrying rise in casualties in recent years and documented large areas newly contaminated or remaining uncleared from earlier conflicts. Casualty figures and contamination maps are stark: thousands of civilian casualties are recorded annually, and conflict zones — including Myanmar, Syria, Afghanistan and Ukraine — continue to account for the majority of recorded victims. The scale of contamination is not merely a battlefield statistic; it is an obstacle to safe agriculture, internal displacement returns, infrastructure repair and economic recovery. In Ukraine, for example, official estimates indicate hundreds of thousands of square kilometres reported as potentially contaminated by mines and explosive remnants — an impediment that will complicate recovery and reconstruction for years. 

Technology: a double-edged sword

Advances in microelectronics, sensors and artificial intelligence are changing both sides of the equation. On the one hand sensor-fused munitions, combination fuzes and programmable dispensers allow greater tactical sophistication: mines that can be switched on and off remotely, munitions that target vehicles rather than persons, and munitions that are programmed to self-neutralise. On the other hand these “improvements” have proven unreliable in practice and introduce new risks. Historical and recent assessments show that self-destruct or self-deactivation mechanisms frequently fail or operate unpredictably; the designation “non-persistent” is therefore no guarantee of safety for civilians years later. Moreover the same digital tools that armers claim improve discrimination are now being adapted to render emplaced devices difficult to detect: reduced metal content, novel casings and complex sensor signatures that defeat conventional detector suites. 

Detection and clearance: innovation and limits

Responding to this threat, researchers and demining organisations have accelerated work on detection and clearance. Robotic platforms, aerial systems, infrared and hyperspectral imaging, ground-penetrating radar and computer-vision models are all being trialled and improved. Recent studies show promising results from deep-learning approaches applied to long-wave infrared imagery and from robotic systems integrating multiple sensing modalities; these approaches offer better recall and improved operational safety for clearance teams. Yet there is an important caveat: technology can assist but not replace painstaking, time-consuming clearance operations. Devices buried in complex soils, impedeed by debris, or deliberately masked are notoriously difficult to locate, and any reliance on new detection algorithms must be evaluated against the real risk of false negatives. 

Legal and ethical frameworks

The Mine Ban Treaty remains the principal legal instrument meant to eliminate anti-personnel mines; its near-universal adherence in the late twentieth century was a remarkable humanitarian achievement. Yet the Treaty was never universal, and the recent political decisions by several NATO and EU members to modify or abandon their obligations have undermined the long-standing taboo. Humanitarian organisations warn that these strategic withdrawals will translate into more mines on the ground and hence more civilian suffering. At the same time, there is no straightforward technical fix: weakening international protections for the sake of short-term deterrence risks entrenching civilian harm. 

Policy and practical responses

Two complementary policy lines should inform a responsible response. First, states and alliances must reassess doctrine to minimise civilian harm: restrict the circumstances of mine use, favour alternatives to persistent area denial, and maintain transparent stockpile controls and reporting. Second, the international community must invest far more in clearance capacity, mine-risk education, victim assistance and research into safe, reliable detection. Technical improvements in detection and robotics are promising, but must be paired with funding, local capacity building and the political will to clear contaminated land quickly after hostilities cease.

Conclusions

Modern landmine technology is neither a purely technical problem nor solely a moral one: it sits at the intersection of military necessity, technological possibility and humanitarian responsibility. The last two decades had seen substantial progress towards reducing landmine harms; the recent reversal in norms and renewed operational uses — together with the difficulties of guaranteeing the reliability of “smart” features — threaten to reverse that progress. Confronting this reality requires a clear and sustained commitment from states, militaries, technologists and humanitarian organisations to put civilian protection at the centre of doctrine and to fund the hard, unglamorous work of detection, clearance and rehabilitation. Absent such commitments, entire regions will remain blighted long after the guns fall silent.