By Al-Fassel | 2024-10-21

The US military last week used B-2 stealth bombers and bunker busting bombs to hit sites in Yemen controlled by the Iran-backed Houthis.

The bombers hit five hardened underground depots housing various weapon components of types that the Houthis have used against civilian and military vessels throughout the region, US Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III said October 16.

"This was a unique demonstration of the United States' ability to target facilities that our adversaries seek to keep out of reach, no matter how deeply buried underground, hardened, or fortified," he said.

The attacks were made "to degrade the [Houthis'] capability to continue their reckless and unlawful attacks on international commercial shipping and on US, coalition, and merchant personnel and vessels in the Red Sea, Bab Al-Mandeb Strait, and the Gulf of Aden, and to degrade their ability to threaten regional partners," US Central Command said in a statement the same day.

The Houthis have attacked over 80 vessels since October 2023.

Bunker busting capabilities

The B-2s reportedly dropped GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP)/B bunker-buster bombs on the Houthis.

Few aircraft can deploy the bomb, which is designed to attack deep bunkers. One can weigh 13,608kg.

While details remain classified, it reportedly can penetrate 60 meters of reinforced concrete.

In photos of the GBU-57 from May 2023, stenciling on the bombs listed their weight as 12,300kg and described them as carrying a mix of AFX-757 -- a standard explosive -- and PBXN-114, a relatively new explosive compound.

The five targets were in the Sanaa capital area and the Houthi stronghold of Saada in the north, and likely included three missile force locations on the southern outskirts of the Sanaa area -- Jabal Attan, Al Hafa and Nandayn, the Maritime Executive reported.

Each of those three has housed a missile brigade since the 1980s, and each has nearby access to deep bunkers carved from caves.

Sending a message

This was the first B-2 bombing of the Houthis. Previous US and UK strikes on targets in Yemen used lighter aircraft unable to carry such heavy ordnance.

The GBU-57 also serves as an indirect warning to Iran.

The United States originally developed it in the 2000s over concerns that Iran was building nuclear sites underground.

The strikes in Yemen demonstrate to Tehran what a GBU-57 strike in Iran could do to deeply buried nuclear and missile facilities, according to Maritime Executive.

"The attack therefore strengthens the United States' deterrent posture, and is a demonstration of what the United States might be capable of if Iranian actions were to escalate and draw in the United States," it said.