[Blueflag]

Gotcha, but ... (remembering I know nuthin about arty) The smoke trails behind the ‘stars’ imply a slow descent through the atmosphere. Cluster bomblets don’t fall slowly or ‘burn’ in the air as they descend.

Am I off base here?

Just tryin’ to get to the bottom of it ... and burn Reuters of course.

[usmcobra]

Actually I've never seen them in use, so I wouldn't know what they look like, but the precise altitude effect is clear from the pictures. All the shells are coming apart at the same height. Willy pete normally is used with an impact fuse.

there is also the issue of size of fragments to consider, these shells appear to have the same number of fragments as opposed to a spraying of thousands of tiny pieces like you would find from WP, typically a white cloud of particles. in all directions

[driftdiver]

Could be anti-personal rounds designed to burst overhead and throw fragments down.