The Economist Jun 19, 2025 03:22 PM IST Just how sturdy and thick the Iranian concrete is, and the way a lot America’s bomb has been upgraded, could make the distinction between success and failure. ISRAELI AIR strikes have destroyed some buildings on the floor of Iran’s nuclear amenities, however the coronary heart of the operation at websites such because the Fordow fuel-enrichment plant remains to be more likely to be intact, hidden deep underground. Destroying one of these facility requires bunker-busting bombs extra highly effective than something Israel can ship. Donald Trump, America’s president, has indicated in latest days that he’s coming round to the concept of serving to. On June seventeenth he warned “our patience is wearing thin” with Iran. Reaching Iran’s bunkers will take a particular type of bomb: the US Air Force’s GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOP). In this photograph launched by the U.S. Air Force on May 2, 2023, airmen take a look at a GBU-57, or the Massive Ordnance Penetrator bomb, at Whiteman Air Base in Missouri(US Air Force through AP, File) The MOP is a large weapon weighing 13 tonnes; standard bombs are nearer to at least one tonne. It is deployed on the UFO-like B-2 stealth bomber—flown completely by the US Air Force—which may carry solely two at a time. The bomb has by no means been utilized in motion. .Whereas the MOP can undergo over 60 metres of normal concrete, which may stand up to 5,000 pounds-per-square-inch (psi) of strain, that drops to eight metres for concrete of double the energy. The MOP is dropped from excessive altitude to smash by rock utilizing sheer kinetic power. It has a narrower profile than general-purpose bombs to pay attention the power in a small space, and most of its weight comes from its thick metal casing. Only 20% of the bomb’s complete weight is the explosive filler. The casing is a particular ultra-strong alloy generally known as Eglin Steel (named after an Air Force base in Florida the place it was developed). A MOP can reportedly penetrate 60 metres of normal concrete (see chart). The bomb was first examined in 2007, and its design has been upgraded a number of instances since. At least 20 are recognized to have been delivered within the first batch. As with smaller bunker-busters, MOPs are in all probability fitted with a void-sensing fuse which detects its environment and detonates when it emerges from stable rock right into a cavity. A facility might need a number of ranges, and the fuse might be programmed to blow up on the third degree underground, for instance, with the intention to trigger essentially the most harm. MOPs have been developed by America’s air power when it discovered that its present bunker-busters couldn’t harm Iraqi bunkers throughout the invasion in 2003. A brand new weapon needed to be rushed into service. The MOP aimed to smash even deeper and tougher bunkers being inbuilt Iran and North Korea. However, there are limits to what even the most important standard bomb can do. Whereas the MOP can undergo over 60 metres of normal concrete, which may stand up to 5,000 pounds-per-square-inch (psi) of strain, that drops to eight metres for concrete of double the energy. In latest years Iran has superior significantly within the discipline of Ultra High-Performance Concrete (UHPC), producing materials with strengths of 30,000 psi or extra. The Pentagon is nicely conscious of the problem posed by UHPC. By 2014 it had developed its personal model, Eglin High-Strength Concrete, for weapons checks. This doesn’t imply the issue has been solved. In a 2021 article in Aerospace & Defence Technology, {a magazine}, Gregory Vartanov of Advanced Materials Development, a Canadian defence-materials firm, claimed that bombs created from Eglin metal wouldn’t be sturdy sufficient to penetrate the perfect UHPC. Just how sturdy and thick the Iranian concrete is, and the way a lot America’s bomb has been upgraded, could make the distinction between success and failure. And even when the bomb can break by, hitting the goal might not be easy. MOPs want nice accuracy to be efficient and, like most American guided bombs, they depend on GPS satellite tv for pc steerage. Military GPS is meant to be jam-resistant, however in Ukraine American-supplied bombs have been severely affected by Russian jamming. In some circumstances it had reportedly decreased their accuracy from 20 metres to 1,200 metres earlier than fixes helped to revive their accuracy. But jamming strategies have improved too, turning it right into a cat-and-mouse sport. Israel is much less reliant on GPS, and has options such because the SPICE steerage system, which depends on cameras on bombs and makes use of AI-guided steering to succeed in the goal. Israel has used weapons with SPICE within the present marketing campaign towards Iran. America could need to unexpectedly retrofit this—or an American equal—to a MOP if America’s generals lack confidence in GPS, though this course of might take some weeks. No standard bomb besides a MOP has an opportunity of ending off Fordow, and solely America can provide them. But even when Donald Trump decides to drop one (and even a number of), it’s not assured to succeed. America-s-huge-bunker-busting-bomb-is-not-sure-to-
No Comment! Be the first one.