US 'bunker-busters' likely not strong enough for Iranian targets

The U.S.'s biggest conventional bomb is not capable of destroying Iran's most heavily-guarded nuclear bunkers, the Pentagon has concluded, according to a Wall Street Journal report on Saturday.

The report, based on information from U.S. government sources, said the U.S. Department of Defense is boosting its efforts to make the bomb more powerful.

The 14-ton (30,000-pound) Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP), known as the "bunker-buster" bomb, was built specifically to be able to pierce through the heavy fortifications surrounding Iranian and North Korean nuclear facilities.

However, initial experiments revealed that the bomb, as it is currently built, would not be able to destroy some Iranian nuclear facilities, either because of their depth in the ground or because of new fortifications added by Tehran to secure them.

Among the heavily-protected bunkers that the U.S. bomb would have difficulty penetrating is the Fordow uranium enrichment plant, buried deep in the mountains near the Iranian city of Qom, and surrounded by anti-aircraft batteries.

A U.S. official said some at the Pentagon believe conventional weapons will not be effective against the Fordow facility and that only a tactical nuclear weapon could work if the U.S. wants to completely destroy the facility.

"Once things go into the mountain, then really you have to have something that takes the mountain off," the official said.

He added that the MOP might have a better chance of destroying Iran's Natanz enrichment plant, "but even that is guesswork."

Doubts about the effectiveness of the MOP led the Pentagon this month to secretly seek an additional $82 million from Congress to improve the bomb's capabilities. The move comes as part of stepped-up preparations in the U.S. for a possible attack on Iran.

While some experts question whether any kind of conventional bomb could reach the deeply-hidden Iranian nuclear bunkers, officials in the U.S. Defense Department believe the MOP could already cause enough damage to delay Iran's nuclear program.

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told The Wall Street Journal that he expected a more powerful MOP to be ready soon. "We're developing it. I think we're pretty close, let's put it that way. But we're still working at it because these things are not easy to be able to make sure that they will do what we want them to," he said. "But I'm confident, frankly, that we're going to have that capability and have it soon."

Panetta also said that Iran may not be the only potential target of the new bomb. "It's not just aimed at Iran. Frankly, it's aimed at any enemy that decides to locate it in some kind of impenetrable location. The goal here is to be able to get at any enemy, anywhere," he told The Wall Street Journal.

Pentagon spokesman George Little added, "The development of this weapon is not intended to send a signal to any one particular country ... It's a capability we believe we need in our arsenal and will continue to invest in it."

Meanwhile, The New York Times reported last week that Israeli intelligence assessments, supported by academic studies, have cast doubt on the widespread belief that an attack on Iran would ignite a "catastrophic set of events like a regional conflagration, widespread acts of terrorism and sky-high oil prices."

According to the report, the intelligence assessments, which several of the country's top officials have adopted, reveal that the threat of Iranian retaliation to an Israeli or U.S. attack "is partly bluff," and they are being taken into account in Israeli calculations of whether to strike Iran.

Another paper that will soon be published by Tel Aviv University's Institute for National Security Studies claims that Iran's recent threat that it will close the Strait of Hormuz is also largely a bluff.

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