Yup, the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) needs to be harder, according to anonymous Pentagon sources cited in a Wall Street Journal article. A series of recent tests found that the Air Force’s 30,000-pound tool for penetrating 32 stories of reinforced concrete might not have enough penetrating power to take out Iran’s most heavily protected nuclear […]
The Deadlies
Imagine flying, along with 20 or so fellow aircrew, in an Air Force E-8C Joint Surveillance Targeting and Attack Radar System (JSTARS) jet for a mission to track down insurgents planting roadside bombs in Iraq or Afghanistan. You’ve just taken off from your base in Qatar but before you can go scan the ground for […]
Improvised explosive devices — the hand-cobbled roadside bombs that have taken a terrible toll on troops in Iraq and Afghanistan — are a lot like malaria, the Army’s chief scientist said Friday. You can treat malaria, you can eradicate the conditions in which it occurs, but it’s been around a long time and probably it […]
Rogue states with nascent nuclear weapon programs (cough, Iran, cough), consider yourselves on notice. The Air Force has started taking delivery of Massive Ordnance Penetrators. Yup, the 30,000-pound bunker busters, known as MOPs, designed to penetrate 30 stories of reinforced concrete. (Oh, and the massive bomb’s name is almost as charged as the term, Pre-Dawn […]
What’s the latest U.S. drone to be armed? The Navy’s MQ-8 Fire Scout helicopter. Northrop Grumman has begun helping the Navy arm the little robo-choppers with the Advanced Precision Kill Weapons System — basically, laser-guided 70-mm Hydra rockets, according to a company announcement. The newly armed Fire Scouts will give ships — especially smaller ones that can’t […]
