The United States Air Force has ordered a batch of cutting-edge new bunker buster bombs, Defense News reported this week, reaching for the successor technology to huge ordnance which pounded Iranian nuclear sites in June.
The new Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) contract has been awarded to Applied Research Associates (ARA) for a two-year prototype design, according to the outlet.
Boeing, which originally developed the MOP, will team up with ARA for the design and full integration of new features, it added in an article on Monday.
The bombs the United States used against Iranian nuclear sites in Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan in a surprise attack on June 22 were GBU-57 MOPs.
The GBU-57 is a 30,000-pound GPS-guided bunker buster designed to destroy hardened and deeply buried nuclear facilities which is carried by the B-2 Spirit bomber.
Its first combat use came in the June strikes in the strikes dubbed Operation Midnight Hammer, when the Air Force dropped 12 bombs on the Fordow nuclear site alone.
The successor MOP, called the Next Generation Penetrator (NGP_ will focus on deeper penetration and reduced weight. Unlike the GBU-57, it will not exceed 22,000 pounds, and its guidance system will remain effective even if the enemy jams or disables GPS.
The weapon will also incorporate advanced fuzing to increase effectiveness against previously untested environments, another outlet The War Zone reported.
“Advanced fuzes with features like the ability to ‘count’ floors to determine depth and sense the ‘voids’ formed by underground mission spaces greatly increase the potential for maximum damage from a weapon like MOP,” TWZ wrote.
The United States began designing the GBU-57 in 2004 under the Air Force Research Laboratory, with production and first deliveries starting in 2011.
President Donald Trump has said the bombings "obliterated" Iran's nuclear program, adding that his decision to strike the sites forestalled a nuclear war.
