The Iran MOP Up Option: Air Force’s Biggest Bombs are Ready to Teach Iran a Lesson: As talks about Iran’s nuclear weapons program move forward, the U.S. military is keeping up the pressure with an array of forces in place under United States Central Command.
“We do not want to see war. This is not a president that campaigned on starting wars. And as he said very clearly, Iran is not going to have a nuclear weapon, and he reserves every right to prevent that from happening,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on April 23.
The MOP Option for Iran
If Iran’s diplomats waver, there is always the MOP option – using the U.S. Air Force’s biggest non-nuclear bombs called Massive Ordnance Penetrators to pierce the defenses at Iran’s underground sites.
Don’t rule out cyber options and commando raids, but over the years, the U.S. has developed specific techniques to take out a big chunk of Iran’s capabilities from the air.
The U.S. Air Force has been at work on the combination of big bombs and programmable fuses for over 20 years, based on lessons learned from the 1991 Gulf War.
It’s not all targeted at Iran; North Korea and China have underground hide sites for missiles, artillery, and command posts.
However, the result is the U.S., if ordered, would have no problem carrying out a precision strike plan specifically designed to destroy Iran’s capabilities.
MOP Explained
The GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator combines a 30,000-pound class explosive with a specialized fuse. Consider the progress made with miniaturized munitions like Small Diameter Bomb, enabled by explosive materials that are more powerful.
Scaled up to a larger bomb, the weapons are more than capable of damaging hardened targets. Programmable fuses can also be set to tunnel into the earth and sense the presence of a void – such as an underground weapons site – before detonating. In fact, the Large Penetrator Smart Fuse for the MOP became a quick-reaction program in 2018 and at least one live drop from the B-2 was completed in 2020, with additional sled testing in 2021. Pile multiple MOPs onto the same target and damage will be epic.
All this is why the display of B-2 stealth bombers at Diego Garcia was so significant. An attack to disable a key part of Iran’s nuclear weapons program was once a distant possibility. However, Iran’s two missile and drone attacks on Israel in 2024 changed the calculus, revealing Iran’s tactical weaknesses. Israel’s retaliation on October 26, 2024, hit Iranian surface-to-air missile sites, missile production, and other capabilities. Iran did not strike back.
Aicraft Carriers are Key
The ability to strike at Iran also depends on the two U.S. Navy aircraft carriers, USS Harry S. Truman and USS Carl Vinson.
The two 97,000-ton ships are currently running 24/7 flight operations. Typically, one carrier launches the daytime sorties while the other configures for night operations, readjusting flight deck schedules for night launches with some of the crew sleeping during the day.
Aircraft from the carriers can provide air superiority, maintain an intelligence and surveillance tracking picture, and join in defense against drone attacks, for example.
The carrier strike options are there for extra firepower and emergency contingencies, and no host-nation permission is needed for them to launch operations, an important consideration given the political sensitivities of regional allies.
THAAD and Missile Defense
Another top priority will be defending all U.S. forces across the Central Command region, from Syria to Iraq to the Gulf-region air bases. Systems like THAAD and Patriot are primed to intercept; THAAD had its first operational use in 2022 when the UAE intercepted a Houthi missile headed toward the air base at Al Dhafra, a frequent deployment stop for U.S. Air Force F-22s and F-35s. Expect regional allies to be all in favor of participating in defensive operations.
Any limited strike on Iran would have to be backed up by the full spread of U.S. Navy sea-based missile defense. In April 2024, U.S. Navy destroyers USS Arleigh Burke (DDG-51) and USS Carney (DDG-64) fired a clutch of SM-3 Standard Missiles for an exo-atmospheric kill of inbound Iranian missiles. The destroyers took their shots nose-on from the Eastern Mediterranean.
Don’t Forget About Space Force
Finally, count on the United States Space Force. Early warning from space foiled Iran’s “Operation Martyr Soleimani” launch of 12 ballistic missiles at U.S. forces at Al-Asad Air Base, Iraq on January 7, 2020.
Guardians stepped up again with missile warning data dispersed during the April 2024 attack from Iran against Israel. By the time of Iran’s second attack on Israel in October, the Guardians had upgraded their software and tactics. “First time, we did well; second time, we did even better,” said one major, the division chief for current operations at Space Delta 5, told Air and Space Forces Magazine. “We had a far better data fidelity rate. We had a lot better warning times,” the major said.
B-2 Bomber. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
What Happens Next?
Iran has long refused to live up to its commitments to nuclear material inspection and restraint. As of June 2024, Iran had more than 30 times the limit of stored enriched uranium. Even the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency does not claim to know the location of all of Iran’s centrifuges.
The idea of Iran’s once-vaunted uranium enrichment centrifuge sites filled with gaping holes, visible from satellite imagery, should amply stimulate negotiations.
About the Author: Dr. Rebecca Grant
Dr. Rebecca Grant, Vice President of the Lexington Institute, is a national security analyst based in Washington, DC specializing in defense and aerospace research and national security consulting. She has researched and published hundreds of articles on national security and spoken at numerous forums. In addition, Dr. Grant has often appeared on television as an expert on national security for Fox News, Fox Business, CNN, and MSNBC and as a series regular on The Smithsonian’s Air Warriors. Dr. Grant also writes on China, Russia and other technology and national security topics for Fox News Opinion. Her military books include 75 Great Airmen (with Lt. Gen. Chris Miller), The B-2 Goes to War, and Battle-Tested: Aircraft Carriers in Afghanistan and Iraq. Dr. Grant graduated from Wellesley College and earned a PhD in International Relations from the London School of Economics, University of London.
Girth Fader
April 27, 2025 at 8:12 pm
Destroying the Islamic Republic of Iran’s ability to develop and manufacture nuclear weapons is good.
I’d also want to destroy its ability to wage aggressive war. Its navy, air, drone, missile, and armored forces, including the manufacture, supply, operation, and maintenance of these specialized systems are also good targets. Replacing them would be difficult, expensive, and time consuming.
Sanctions with a blockade would make it harder for Iran to support their paramilitary proxies: the Houthis, Hamas, and Hezbollah. The region would thank us.
And if some disaffected Iranian group who is reasonably capable, sensible, and humane wants to replace the current ruling class and its agents of oppression, then help them with light weapons. Who knows? They could win a fair fight against a crippled and unpopular Islami-fascist regime.
We don’t need boots on the ground and we don’t need to rebuild or reform anything.
Since most of the oil and gas is in the southwestern part of the country, try to make sure a local ally who is willing to sell it controls that vital terrain. Civil wars are expensive and he’s going to need money to win and rebuild.
Americans hate American casualties and this approach would produce very few of them — almost none.
We may break it but so what? It doesn’t mean we’ve bought anything.
Tragedian
April 27, 2025 at 10:20 pm
Russia’s current fixation on Ukraine makes it a great time for Western powers to pick off Russia’s authoritarian and unpopular allies. So even if Russia wins something in Ukraine, it can lose everything every place else.
waco
April 28, 2025 at 12:59 am
Iran can tell Rubio to go to hell. Many nations have nukes, like Israel, north Korea, Pakistan and India, why Iran can’t have nukes.
Iran an untermensch-type nation, perhaps. A nation that is morally inferior or wholly sub-human.
People like Rubio can just go to hell, right now.
Iran’s not responsible for the daily slaughtering of Gaza inhabitants happening today.
On the other hand, Israel which has been using live humans as free target practice for the benefit of its military, has every right to possess nuclear weapins.
WHAT THE HECK.
Israel alone holds the keys to unlock the strictly forbidden gates of Megiddo, and no one else. The spirit of Asmodeus will at the right rlyime instruct Israeli politicians when to unlock the gates.
What MORE do people like Rubio want. Hell right now ???
Zhduny
April 28, 2025 at 3:41 am
USA has no right to hold Iran to ransom. The country is actually an illegal entity now made legal through use of deadly force against the red indian nations.
See Dakota wars of the 1860s.
Back to present day.
In today’s present day, USA has become the 21st century genghis, bombing and burying other nations. Now bombing Yemen today. Tomorrow, Iran ?
Researchers have said US military primacy today directly threatens world peace.
Google US could eliminate Russia and china’s nuclear capabilities in two hours.
The reason for that is both Russia and china today simply still don’t possess the presence of mind or the instinct of survivalist knowledge to deploy (at least some minimum) nukes systems in space.
Thus the two nations need to observe the unfolding USA-Iran situation closely.
If USA ‘MOPs’ Iran in a mere ten to twenty minutes, Russia and china, due to size, would surely get ‘MOPed’ in under two hours !
RequestBeingVerified
April 28, 2025 at 3:54 am
The GBU-57 mega monster bomb is the conventional equivalent of the B61 nuclear penetrator.
While the B61 is deliverable by fighter jets like the F-15E and the F-35, the GBU-57 can only be deployed by heavy bombers, specifically the B-2 and the B-21.
That’s why the US has spent and still is spending hundreds of billions of bucks to develop those aircraft. The GBU-57 enables the air force to inflict nuclear-like destruction on other nations without actual use of nukes.
Countries with a big large bullseye marked on their heads need to come up with solutions to confront the sinister aim of the US, unless they want to end up like the red indian nations.
Commentar
April 28, 2025 at 5:10 am
America is a nation fascinated by ‘options’ and generally, none of them are ever good or even honourable.
In the sixties, shortly after LBJ became president after John Kennedy was assassinated, the US hatched the option of a massive strike against the Soviet union, in case it was found to be involved in assassination cases within the US.
That option was included in the secret DoD document of SIOP-64 in which US strategic command would execute both conventional and nuclear strikes with the purpose of removing the Soviet union “from the category of a major industrial power” and to destroy it as a “viable” society.
That option seems to be still alive and well, and ready again for Washington to use it against Iran.
The world needs to be aware what kind of regime controls america today.
Letsgobrandon
April 28, 2025 at 7:47 am
The United States seemingly has the authority to pass public judgement on other countries, whether it is panama, Greenland, Cuba, Venezuela or, today, iran.
What the feckin’ feck. It is truly the most abominable of all modern abominations.
Can the rest of the world also be equally lawful to pass judgement on the US.
Or is it that in the world, only US has the right to be accuser, prosecutor, judge, jury and executioner.
The rest of the world must thereby engage the US in an all-out arms race to select the real judge and jury.
The spread of nuclear arms is now absolutely necessary, especially in the new underwater torpedo drone class.
That particular weapon has much usefulness considering the US borders both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
A few or several of them would just be perfect to see the end of the great Babylon the mother of all abominations.
Jim
April 28, 2025 at 10:18 am
“…the result is the U.S., if ordered, would have no problem carrying out a precision strike plan…”
But would it be successful?
That’s the Question.
And, perhaps, this is beyond the scope of the article, but what would be the overall result in the Middle East?
“Iran’s two missile and drone attacks on Israel in 2024 changed the calculus, revealing Iran’s tactical weaknesses.”
To the contrary, those attacks revealed Israeli tactical weaknesses… perhaps, even strategic weakness. Hypersonic missiles penetrated Israeli airspace and evaded Israel’s vaunted surface to air defense systems. The point of the attacks wasn’t to destroy targets… it was to demonstrate Iran’s missiles can penetrate Israeli defenses…
And, they did. It was a successful demonstration of Iran’s military capability.
“Israel’s retaliation on October 26, 2024, hit Iranian surface-to-air missile sites, missile production, and other capabilities.”
It has been claimed this was a successful mission.
Again, to the contrary, Israeli F-35’s held up roughly 75 miles or so outside Iranian airspace because they picked up a radar system they were unfamiliar with and because of that never penetrated Iranian airspace… launching their weapons from beyond Iranian territory and did some damage, but didn’t take out substantial radar and missile defenses, so a second Israeli wave was only partially carried out, and a third wave was canceled or aborted altogether.
Of course, identifying where all these deep facilities are located is another question all together.
The author is typical of hawkish analysts, assume everything goes according to plan… and everything is good to go for an attack on Iran’s various military facilities.
Sorry, there are no guarantees it would be successful, and the blow back could engulf the entire Middle East in a destructive war and shut the Straight of Hormuz causing oil prices to go through the roof.
Israel could be struck with devastating blows in retaliation and if Israeli political leaders feel these attacks rise to an ‘existential threat’ this would likely trigger an Israeli nuclear strike on Iran.
The author of the article seems blithely unaware of these risks to Israel and the Middle East more generally.
The author seems completely unaware of Iran’s defensive capabilities (which have been enhanced with a security & economic agreement with Russia) and would advise the U. S. to run right over the waterfall. (Haven’t we done that enough already?)
Naive to the point of reckless endangerment.
We can’t have that… warmongers selling wars that hurt the United States interests.
That is unpatriotic and dangerous.
Reject this kind of “Happy Talk” it’s dangerous to the American People.