The Pentagon's New 30,000-lb MOP Bomb Is Ready To Go

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http://www.businessinsider.com/pentagon-michael-gilmore-report-congress-massive-ordnance-penetrator-mop-bomb-ready-aviationist-2013-1


Chicago based Boeing manufactures the MOP shown here for scale

Senior Pentagon officials told Congress the nation's largest conventional bomb, the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP), is ready for action.

The Air Force said as much back in June after rushing the MOP back to Boeing for $82 million in modifications and enhancements, but this report puts it on the books as deployable ordnance.

According to Bloomberg’s Tony Capaccio, on his annual report, the Pentagon’s director of operational testing Michael Gilmore confirmed that tests conducted with the heavy GBU-57, a 20-foot long, 30,000 pound GPS-guided bomb thought able to penetrate 200 feet of concrete before exploding, have demonstrated that the redesigned bomb is able to hit and destroy deeply buried targets.

The enhanced MOP features tail-fin modifications to fix bugs identified in testings as well as as a second fuse to destroy hardened underground targets.


Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/pentagon-michael-gilmore-report-congress-massive-ordnance-penetrator-mop-bomb-ready-aviationist-2013-1#ixzz2I8Guw6m1

[newfie11]

1. Just what the world needs

[Sherman A1]

2. Charming,

simply charming.......

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

3. 200 feet of concrete BEFORE exploding? Holy chit. nt

[Scootaloo]

4. So all told, that's $110 million. For something that blows up.

We don't need to cut "defense" spending. We need to hack it to a fucking stump.

[The Straight Story]

5. Ah, but think of the money it can make....

In Mali there is a lot of gold, diamonds, and uranium to be mined. If we blow up people there who might not cooperate with our desires to mine it and sell it to us we will make that money back....

But yeah, I agree - we spend so much money to kill people and so little to help people. And when you say you want to help people with that money instead people get all bent out of shape as though it were a bad thing.

[Berlum]

6. Planetary-scale Poison Penis

"Bend over, Mother Earth." - Military-Industrial War Complex, Inc.

[Javaman]

7. the non-nuclear bomb bombs...

there was the old neutron bomb, that fried people but left the buildings intact, but that nasty fallout is still a problem.

What to do, what to do...

I got it!

Build bigger regular bombs! Packs the punch of a low yield nuke and doesn't leave any of that messy fallout!

It's win-win!

[ProgressiveProfessor]

8. A specialty weapon for a specific task

Iran's subterranean complexes are no longer secure

[RomneyLies]

9. Selling that may take some of the sting out of Boeing's Dreamliner fiasco.

And it being announced today may stop the Boeing stock from going into absolute freefall after Japan grounded the Dreamliner.

It's sad when money trumps people.