Latest news with #BunkerBusters
International Business Times
26-06-2025
- Politics
- International Business Times
Dramatic Footage Released by Pentagon Shows How 3,000-Pound Bunker-Buster Bombs Were Used to Destroy Iran's Fordow Nuclear Site
The Pentagon has released dramatic footage that shows the power of the 30,000-pound heavy-duty bunker-buster bombs used in strikes against Iran, designed to demolish fortified targets deep underground. This came as Iran admitted Wednesday that its nuclear sites suffered massive damage after the bombings. The chilling video captures a GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) crashing into its target, sending up a huge cloud of dust just seconds before a massive fireball erupts through a ventilation shaft at the Fordow uranium enrichment facility. According to the pilots, the explosion was unlike anything they had ever seen, describing it as "the brightest explosion" they had witnessed — saying "it literally looked like daylight." Image of Devastation "Unlike a normal surface bomb, you won't see an impact crater because they're designed to deeply bury and then function," Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Lt. Gen. Dan Caine explained to reporters during a press briefing Thursday. "All six weapons at each vent at Fordow [uranium enrichment plant] went exactly where they were intended to go." During the briefing, another camera angle showed a slow-motion shot of an MOP hitting its target, cutting cleanly through the curved interior of a second ventilation shaft without triggering an explosion. General Caine also presented a third video, showing the MOP smoothly entering what he referred to as the "mission space." "A bomb has three effects that causes damage: blast, fragmentation and overpressure," he explained. "In this case, the primary kill mechanisms in the mission space was a mix of overpressure and blast." The Power of Bunker Busters Bunker Busters are the largest conventional (non-nuclear) bombs in the U.S. military's arsenal. The bomb was necessary because the target — the Fordow uranium enrichment plant — is buried roughly 300 feet deep within a mountain near the city of Qom, about two hours south of Tehran. The bomb, known as the GBU-57A/B Massive Ordnance Penetrator, was developed by Boeing specifically for use by the U.S. Air Force. Due to its massive weight, the bomb can only be deployed by a B-2 Spirit stealth bomber — an advanced aircraft that is not part of Israel's air force arsenal. "The United States controls the bomber and the bomb," John Spencer, chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute at West Point military academy, recently told The New York Post. The missile cost the U.S. Army more than $500 million to develop and was specifically engineered to burrow deep into the Fordow facility to destroy its nuclear centrifuges, according to a 2013 report by The Wall Street Journal. At the time, the report noted that 20 of these bombs had been produced for the U.S. military. Another variant of a "bunker buster" is the GBU-37, which weighs 5,000 pounds. While the U.S. has provided Israel with less powerful bunker-busting munitions, it has refused to share the Massive Ordnance Penetrator with any allied nation.
New York Times
22-06-2025
- Politics
- New York Times
U.S. Officials Concede They Don't Know Whereabouts of Iran's Uranium Stockpile
A day after President Trump declared that Iran's nuclear program had been 'completely and totally obliterated' by American bunker-busting bombs and a barrage of missiles, the actual state of the program seemed far more murky, with senior officials conceding they did not know the whereabouts of Iran's stockpile of near-bomb-grade uranium. 'We are going to work in the coming weeks to ensure that we do something with that fuel and that's one of the things that we're going to have conversations with the Iranians about,' Vice President JD Vance told ABC's 'This Week' on Sunday, referring to a batch of uranium sufficient to make nine or ten atomic weapons. Nonetheless, he contented that the country's potential to build a weapon had been set back substantially because it no longer had the equipment to turn that fuel into operative weapons. In a briefing for reporters on Sunday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of staff, Dan Caine, avoided Mr. Trump's maximalist claims of success. They said an initial battle-damage assessment of all three sites struck by Air Force B-2 bombers and Navy Tomahawk missiles showed 'severe damage and destruction.' Satellite photographs of the primary target, the Fordo uranium enrichment plant that Iran built under a mountain, showed several holes where a dozen 30,000-pound Massive Ordnance Penetrators — one of the largest conventional bombs in the U.S. arsenal — punched deep holes in the rock. The Israeli military's initial analysis concluded that the site, the target of American and Israeli military planners for more than 26 years, sustained serious damage from the strike but had not been completely destroyed. But there was also evidence, according to two Israeli officials with knowledge of the intelligence, that Iran had moved equipment and uranium from the site in recent days. And there was growing evidence that the Iranians, attuned to Mr. Trump's repeated threats to take military action, had removed 400 kilograms, or roughly 880 pounds, of uranium enriched to 60 percent purity. That is just below the 90 percent that is usually used in nuclear weapons. Rafael Mariano Grossi, the director of general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said by text that the fuel had last been seen by his teams of United Nations inspectors about a week before Israel began its attacks on Iran. But he said on CNN that 'Iran has made no secret that they have protected this material.' Asked by text later in the day whether he meant that the fuel stockpile — which is stored in special casks small enough to fit in the trunks of about 10 cars — had been moved, he replied, 'I do.'
India.com
22-06-2025
- Politics
- India.com
Donald Trump's deadly Bunker Busters fail to damage Iran's underground nuclear sites because..., bad news for Israel due to...
Donald Trump's deadly Bunker Busters fail to damage Iran's underground nuclear sites because…, bad news for Israel due to... Tehran: America has now also joined the ongoing war between Israel and Iran. US President Donald Trump said that the US military has carried out 'very successful' attacks on Iran's nuclear facilities in Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan. Earlier, Iran had launched dozens of drones towards Israel. After the US attacks, a statement has been issued by Iran's nuclear agency.
