Congress today quietly approved the fast-tracking of the BGU-57A/B or Massive Ordinance Penetrator (MOP)
Super bombs are being fast-tracked by the Pentagon for possible use against nuclear programs in North Korea and Iran. So massive, the GBU-57A/B or Massive Ordnance Penetrator or MOP can only be delivered by a B-52 or a B-2A.
The Pentagon is accelerating by three years plans for a super bunker buster, the GBU-57A/B or Massive Ordnance Penetrator or MOP, a powerful new bomb aimed squarely at the underground nuclear facilities of Iran and North Korea. The gargantuan bomb—longer than 11 persons standing shoulder-to-shoulder or more than 20 feet base to nose, weighs 30,000 pounds. Some 18 percent of its total weight is comprised of explosives.
Guided by a precision GPS system, the MOP can penetrate an unprecedented 200 feet down before exploding with devastation into an underground bunker, such as those buried in Iran and North Korea currently used to shield rogue nuclear programs. Now Congress has quietly advanced $68 million into the 2009 budget to accelerate the purchase and deployment of ten such super bunker busters making clear they are for possible use against the regimes in Iran or North Korea. Pentagon planners are rushing to beat by months the latest June 2010 deadline for just four such bombs, and have been subsequently directed to increase the number of MOPs to at least ten.
In early July 2009, the Defense Department told a Congressional committee that the MOP was the “weapon of choice” for an “urgent operational need” enunciated by both the U.S. Pacific Command, tasked with North Korea, and the Central Command, tasked with Iran. In doing so, the Pentagon accelerated the program by three years.
The GBU-57A/B MOP is so immense it can only be carried by either a B-52 or a B2a Stealth bomber. The weapon’s explosive power is 10 times greater than its predecessor, the BLU-109. Moreover, the GBU-57A/B MOP is one third heavier than the MOAB dubbed the Mother of All Bombs.
Related posts:
- Pentagon accelerating deployment of Super Bunker Buster Bomb
- White House weighing war strategy with Iran
- North Korea not so serious about ridding of nukes
- US has “grand-father of all bombs”
- Syria trying to go Nuclear too?
- Iran holds enough uranium for bomb
- North Korea threatens Nuclear Offensive if Provoked
- Israel seized nuke material before Syrian raid
- Iran has resumed A-bomb project, says West
- IDF Intel: By the end of 2009, Iran will be capable of building a nuclear bomb


