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30,000-Lb. Bomb On Fast Track For Deployment
coondoggie writes "Published reports today say the Pentagon is rattling swords in the direction of North Korea and Iran by speeding the development a 20-foot, 30,000-lb bomb known as Massive Ordnance Penetrator. This weapon is intended to annihilate underground bunkers and other hardened sites (read: long-range missile or underground nuke development) up to 200 ft. underground. The Defense Threat Reduction Agency, which has overseen the development of this monster since 2007, says it is designed to be carried aboard B-2 and B-52 bombers and deployed at high altitudes, from which it would strike the ground at speeds well beyond twice the speed of sound to penetrate the below-ground target." Reuters has more specifics on the MOP's chances for deployment by 2010, and the detail that the bomb's load of explosives weighs in at 5,300 lbs.
a beowulf cluster of these!
:<
Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) GBU-57A/B
A hundred thousand years of human technology, and we're supposed to be impressed at the latest version of the club. Wake me up when the human race does something impressive.
-- thinkyhead software and media
Stop making bombs otherwise we're gonna hit you with the bombs we are making!
You don't understand - you call it your club, the enemy calls it his "Massive Ordinance Penetrator". We both know what you're really referring to and referring to it as heavy as a club, or a massive penetrator doesn't change the fact that you need little blue pills.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
I wonder what what the North Koreas are going to think when they find out about this.
The tunnel system they had in the border areas is the king showing in their hand. As far as a paranoid North Korean is concerned, that was what assured destruction and kept the US from making the first strike. A nutty concern, of course, but let's face it, those North Koreans are a nutty bunch.
At some point, they're going to feel really cornered. Then things will get really interesting.
If one of these doesn't do the trick we can make an airplane capable of dropping one, then another on precisely the same spot a minute later. And a third if need be. six hundred feet of penetration! America wins World's Biggest Penatrator award! can you feel that? Take it right in the bunker bab-- sorry. My point is, with this and smart bomb technology at the level America has it, no bunker is safe anymore, not at any depth. This has an immense geopolitical effect. North Korea is going to have to work even harder to hide their programs--and expose them in the process. Iran can no longer feel safe announcing a nuclear bomb should it develope one. And any country that has, in the past, felt less fear of American military might because of conventional equipment being held in deep bunkers will no longer be as eager to put it to the test. With one weapon, America has greatly advanced its interests everywhere the military counts.
If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
This is really a reinvention and extension of 1940's British technology. Barnes Wallis (of the bouncing "Dam Buster" bomb fame) designed a 5 tonne bomb (Tallboy) in 1943. The larger 10 tonne bomb (Grand Slam) was introduced in early 1945. It was dropped from a Lancaster bomber (by 617 squadron - the Dam Buster squadron) from about 20,000 ft and was close to sonic (320 m/s) when it hit the ground. It was designed as a penetrator, only detonating when well underground. It was used with devastating effect against the German U Boat pens, canals, bridges and viaducts where the "earthquake" effect of a deep explosion undermined foundations. The Grand Slam used 4,144 kg of explosives (Torpex)which is considerably more than the heavier bomb proposed by the US DoD with an earth penetration design depth of 40m. I would imagine that the higher impact speed of the US bomb requires a much stronger casing, but I am surprised at the small ordinance load. It is interesting to note that (as with much British technology) design data for the Grand Slam was shared with the US and a US version was made, but not (as far as I am aware) used in WWII. RobHart
This is important since all the receiving parties are using the metric system, and you wouldn't want them to be confused about this.
"Published reports today say the Pentagon is rattling swords in the direction of North Korea and Iran by speeding the development a 6 m, 14968 kg bomb known as Massive Ordnance Penetrator. This weapon is intended to annihilate underground bunkers and other hardened sites (read: long-range missile or underground nuke development) up to 61 m underground. The Defense Threat Reduction Agency, which has overseen the development of this monster since 2007, says it is designed to be carried aboard B-2.21 and B-53.638 bombers and deployed at high altitudes, from which it would strike the ground at speeds well beyond twice the speed of sound to penetrate the below-ground target." Reuters has more specifics on the MOP's chances for deployment by 2010, and the detail that the bomb's load of explosives weighs in at 2404 kg.
Actually the OST just forbids warheads in orbit. This lead to the development of the F.O.B.S. by Russia. The SALT II agreement was then instituted, which among other things forbids "systems for placing into Earth orbit nuclear weapons or any other kind of weapons of mass destruction, including fractional orbital missiles", but that seems targeted at launch vehicles for warheads, which may not include purely passive kinetic weapons.
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
Um ... no. You realize "penetrate" has meaning completely separate from sexual acts, right?
[Beavis and Butthead style laughter]
You said "sexual".
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
They should write it's power output in terms of sun, in which case it looks really puny next to nuclear. For example, the Tsar Bomba (largest human utilized explosive device, which was detonated at half the possible yield to prevent fallout) actually got into whole number percentages:
"Since 50 Mt is 2.1*10^17 joules, the average power produced during the entire fission-fusion process, lasting around 39 nanoseconds, was about 5.4*10^24 watts or 5.4 yottawatts. This is equivalent to approximately 1.4% of the power output of the Sun.[9]" (Wikipedia).
The "ton" rating they use on nuclear explosives is the TNT equivalent, not the weight. TNT equivalent is an energy measurement (4.184 x 10^9 Joules).
This bomb has 15 tons of mass, but only 2.65 tons of conventional explosives. The Davy Crockett linked by Ihlosi only weighs 51 lbs.
Ever heard of a kinetic penetrator? It is a type of ammunition used in the main gun of tanks. It contains no explosives, but rather a very dense, arrow-like projectile which uses its high speed (and thus its kinetic energy) for all its destructive power. Kinetic energy weapons are generally weapons that rely solely on their kinetic energy for their destructive power.
Other more sci-fi types of kinetic energy weapons would be rail guns and coil guns.
No no no, you're thinking too un-Orwellian. The "Do not ride the bomb!" signs were amended to "Do not ride the bomb without waving a US flag".
I know it's been a long time since America has engaged in it, but it's called diplomacy, not recon. And after he likely completely fails, THEN we can blow the shit out of them righteously, if need be, since we at least tried to talk with the crazy SOB. If the Big Dog can't get N Korea to the table, then no one can. Shoot first and ask questions later (like we (America and it's allies) did in Iraq) is something that Barney Fife would do, and only works in mass market action flicks. You see unlike Iraq, N Korea really DOES have WMD (including chemical and biological weapons), and truly IS a threat to the US and it's allies.
One of these days I'm going to cut you into little pieces. - PF
There are stories that are coming from Burma/Myanmar in which North Korea is helping them to create their own production line. This same country that has done all that it can to hold its citizen back in terms of education, had Russia bring in a 10MW reactor.Burma's explanation for it: Nuclear Medicine. That country is nearly 50 years behind in primary medicine and they are claiming that they want a monster reactor for Nuclear Medicine. Well, nice. Of course, the reactor is being buried in the hillside with Russia and North Korea's help. And apparently, North Korea has been busy helping these ppl. That is why NK absolutely did not want us to board that ship. Apparently W's admin KNEW that Burma was doing this and did nothing about it.
Now, we may be forced down the road to either blow nukes or blow a conventional bomb to destroy these bunkers. Which would you prefer that we do?
What does bother me, is why are we talking disarmament? China is actively building new launch vehicles and there is overwhelming evidence that they have started up new production lines of nuke warhead. They are KNOWN to have at least 600 warheads, but there are some indications that they have over 1000.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Evelyn Waugh - Letter to His Wife - 31st May 1942
No.3 Commando was very anxious to be chums with Lord Glasgow, so they offered to blow up an old tree stump for him and he was very grateful and said don't spoil the plantation of young trees near it because that is the apple of my eye and they said no of course not we can blow a tree down so it falls on a sixpence and Lord Glasgow said goodness you are clever and he asked them all to luncheon for the great explosion.
So Col. Durnford-Slater DSO said to his subaltern, have you put enough explosive in the tree?. Yes, sir, 75lbs. Is that enough? Yes sir I worked it out by mathematics it is exactly right. Well better put a bit more. Very good sir.
And when Col. D Slater DSO had had his port he sent for the subaltern and said subaltern better put a bit more explosive in that tree. I don't want to disappoint Lord Glasgow. Very good sir.
Then they all went out to see the explosion and Col. DS DSO said you will see that tree fall flat at just the angle where it will hurt no young trees and Lord Glasgow said goodness you are clever.
So soon they lit the fuse and waited for the explosion and presently the tree, instead of falling quietly sideways, rose 50 feet into the air taking with it 1/2 acre of soil and the whole young plantation.
And the subaltern said Sir, I made a mistake, it should have been 7 1/2 not 75. Lord Glasgow was so upset he walked in dead silence back to his castle and when they came to the turn of the drive in sight of his castle what should they find but that every pane of glass in the building was broken.
So Lord Glasgow gave a little cry and ran to hide his emotions in the lavatory and there when he pulled the plug the entire ceiling, loosened by the explosion, fell on his head.
This is quite true.
My guess is that this is as much a copy of GrandSlam as the B-2 is a copy of Avro Lancaster, only slightly scaled up.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
That's one amazing hybrid since the U.S. is older than both Australia and Canada.
http://twitter.com/OLDTELEGRAM
Educated minds already know.
This thing is supposed tp go through 60m of 5000psi reinforced concrete, then explode. In a room full of gas centrifuges spinning at over 100K rpm the explosion would be redundant.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Umm... no they don't actually. Please inform us. They have nukes, but no way to deploy them. They have a large army, but are incredibly underfunded. The U.S. military could destroy North Korea and be back by lunch if they pulled no punches. Oh and if by "threat" you mean they could kill a few thousand, then we are talking at cross terms here -- ANYONE could do that, what we are discussing here is whether or not NK has the ability to do REAL damage to the U.S., which I would define as at least knocking the U.S. off of its perch as the dominant superpower. I don't think that any one nation, save China (maybe) has the potential to do that. But hey, you are the smarmy "educated"* one. Please "educate" me.
*Note: Fox News does not count as education
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
I can think of no good ways that they are a direct threat but the fact they would trash the northern half of South Korea in the first half hour of a hot war is one deterrent. They've been training massive amounts of long range artillery of Seoul for years and that would be the first thing to go. They could kill more than a "few thousand". The destruction of of Seoul and their likely ability to overrun the DMZ means they can be very very destructive until we start bringing in the carriers and massing in our own troops. We would also have to do this while managing China's agitation and China IS a real threat.
Incidentally trashing SK is also good for causing some financial turmoil in the rest of the world's market. So it would cost a bit of treasure. At least for awhile.
China seems to use NK the same way a redneck likes to keep a slobbering pitbull on a chain prominently on display in his back yard. Sure you can just shoot the nasty thing dead but it won't be the end of it and it isn't much use talking to it. The redneck is the one you have to reason with.
How could there be any sexual connotation to a massive penetrator exploding deep inside their hidden tunnels? I mean really, this is serious business we're talking about here.
They have nukes, but no way to deploy them
ICBMs and bombers aren't the only way to deploy nukes. They have merchant ships don't they? They have an intelligence agency don't they?
The U.S. military could destroy North Korea and be back by lunch if they pulled no punches
Thanks for demonstrating just how naive you really are. Unless you purpose using nuclear weapons, please explain to me how we could destroy North Korea and be back "by lunch". They have a 1,200,000 man standing army. I don't care how great our advantages in training/tactics and technology are -- we can't simply destroy them and be back home in time for lunch. We would own the oceans and the skies near/over the battlefield and I'm sure the kill ratio would tilt heavily in our favor -- but it would eventually come down to men with rifles and when that happens there's no way to avoid a large number of American casualties. Unless you think we have some sort of technology that magically negates Mr. Kalashnikov's inventions.
what we are discussing here is whether or not NK has the ability to do REAL damage to the U.S., which I would define as at least knocking the U.S. off of its perch as the dominant superpower
NK has the ability to do real damage to at least one critical ally (South Korea) of the United States and perhaps another (Japan). If the United States can't be relied on to defend our friends then we will be knocked off that perch. We enjoy the position that we have because of our relationships with our allies. The United States without allies/basing rights/trading partners is a Western Hemisphere power.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
I can think of no good ways that they are a direct threat but the fact they would trash the northern half of South Korea in the first half hour of a hot war is one deterrent. They've been training massive amounts of long range artillery of Seoul for years and that would be the first thing to go
That artillery wouldn't last very long if a shooting war broke out. We know where a lot of it is and the remainder would reveal itself as soon as they fired the first volley. Between counter-battery fire and US/ROK airpower those artillerymen would have a short and exciting life once the shooting started. The destruction of Seoul isn't very likely -- it wouldn't escape undamaged but it wouldn't be a modern day Dresden either.
their likely ability to overrun the DMZ
This will sound counter-intuitive but we actually want them to overrun the DMZ. We pulled the bulk of our forces back from the DMZ many years ago. The current plan calls for a counterattack into North Korea to cut them off/go after Pyongyang rather than meeting them at the DMZ and fighting for every inch of ROK soil. It's easier to destroy their forces if they are out in the open conducting offensive operations. As Patton said during the Battle of the Bulge, "Let's have the guts to let the Krauts go all the way to Paris. Then, we'll cut them off and chew them up."
China seems to use NK the same way a redneck likes to keep a slobbering pitbull on a chain prominently on display in his back yard. Sure you can just shoot the nasty thing dead but it won't be the end of it and it isn't much use talking to it. The redneck is the one you have to reason with.
ROFL! That's the best analogy ever :)
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
five second kinetic penetrator
Hey, that was my nickname in high school!
Fixed that for you ;)
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Supposedly by next year NK will have icbms which could launch a nuclear warhead to California. Me here on the east coast is safe, but there are 26 or so million people living on that coast who I am sure do not want to be at the mercy of that lunatic dictator. There are other countries that have the capability to hurt as just as much. The difference is that they are not fanatical like North Korea. Until the fascist dictator is gone (including all his descendants) North Korea will pose a threat. Even after they are gone, there will have to be a major political revolution and cooperation with other countries in order for them to not be a threat. On another point, I think North Korea has showed just how powerless and useless the United Nations really is. When dealing with non-cooperative nations diplomacy and sanctions do nothing but to spur more hatred and make them more resilient. Military force is the only way to MAKE them understand and cooperate.
If they understand a few things about America, then they realize that they really can do damage by killing a few thousand - look at all the idiocy we inflicted upon ourselves after al Qaeda killed a few thousand of us.
And it's not like North Korea needs to do it themselves to gain a strategic advantage from it. It is true they have nukes, but no (conventional) way to deploy them. But our borders and shipping routes are pretty porous, and there are plenty of non-state actors out there that could smuggle a weapon in. A single blast to a major American city would do lots of damage well beyond just the death toll.
Knocking us off the pedestal by overwhelming force is not the only possible or fruitful goal.
Unfortunately, educated minds do not run our government!
You seem to be under the same cowboy delusion that sold us an easy win in Iraq 'with flowers for the liberators'. Your appalling lack of geopolitical (not to mention military) knowledge is remarkable but unfortunately all too common in the US.
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
I agree with most of the above, but massed "human wave" attacks against even moderately developed economies are obsolete. They've never been a great idea in the past century, but now they are downright suicidal. Cluster munitions are designed for exactly this scenario, as are tactical (not strategic) nuclear weapons, as are various unmanned ("drone") weapons some of which are not public knowledge. We can't keep NK from doing damage to SK and JP, and we also can't keep guerilla forces in Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistan from doing significant harm to our troops there. But if NK forces decided to storm the DMZ, probably not even 10% would make it through alive. I don't believe even Kim Jong Il would be crazy enough to try this, and most people in SK seem to agree . . they seem to feel reasonably confident, more than I would in their shoes but not totally without reason, that NK has no reason to attack, and every reason not to, and the warlike posture of its leadership is mainly for domestic consumption (much like the anti-Israel rantings of various leaders in North Africa that will never be in a position to harm Israel, but can't win elections unless they promise to).
Nonaggression works!
That artillery wouldn't last very long if a shooting war broke out.
Doesn't have to. Each piece (which, BTW NK has had over 50 years to dig in and fortify) only needs to get off a handful of shots to level Seoul (population 10M) and cause appalling civilian casualties when they have 10,000 of them - about 16 for every square kilometer of Seoul's area.
And that's not counting the nukes, which don't need a fancy delivery system since Seoul is only about 40 km from the border.
This will sound counter-intuitive but we actually want them to overrun the DMZ. We pulled the bulk of our forces back from the DMZ many years ago. The current plan calls for a counterattack into North Korea to cut them off/go after Pyongyang rather than meeting them at the DMZ and fighting for every inch of ROK soil.
And that strategy protects the civilian population of Seoul how? NK doctrine (warning: pdf) is for a quick and decisive victory with overwhelming force concentrated in small areas backed by special ops in the enemy rear - the plan you mention plays right into that strategy.
NK is a hostage negotiation, not strategic diplomacy.
But Saddam Hussein was doing his best to convince the world that he did have WMDs. Unfortunately for him, he succeeded. Before the invasion, no one argued that he didn't have any WMDs...
Sorry, but despite the Neo-Con belief that reality is whatever they say it is, this is total fiction. Colin Powell's PowerPoint show didn't change the fundamental position of the U.N. Security Council or the opinion of many Americans.
From Wikipedia (and yes there are foreign press sites to back this up):
"While Colin Powell's statement to the UN may have been accepted as 'proof' by many in the U.S., this was not the case in Europe, where there was widespread skepticism of any links between Iraq and al-Qaeda."
Powell has since expressed shame over the incident.
Ask me about my sig!
Each piece (which, BTW NK has had over 50 years to dig in and fortify) only needs to get off a handful of shots to level Seoul (population 10M) and cause appalling civilian casualties when they have 10,000 of them
They don't have 10,000 pieces of long range artillery. According to this they only have about 10k-11k total pieces of artillery.
And that's not counting the nukes, which don't need a fancy delivery system since Seoul is only about 40 km from the border.
They still need some sort of delivery system, unless you think they can slingshot their Fat Man sized bombs 40 kilometers. Besides, nukes are a moot point. If they use one they lose the war and the regime doesn't survive. I'd be more worried about them using one when it became apparent that defeat was inevitable and even at that I'd be worried about them using it in the tactical sense (put one somewhere in the path of an advancing American/ROK formation and wait -- no delivery system needed) than trying to get one into Seoul.
And that strategy protects the civilian population of Seoul how?
Who said they were going to make it all the way to Seoul? Did you pay any attention at all to what I said? They are easier to destroy when they are out in the open conducting offensive operations. They set themselves up to be cut off and make their supply lines vulnerable to American/ROK air power.
NK doctrine [globalsecurity.org] (warning: pdf) is for a quick and decisive victory with overwhelming force concentrated in small areas
Overwhelming force concentrations play right into our advantages. Go take a look at military history ranging from WW2 to the Persian Gulf and tell me how well massed force concentrations manage against American air power.
backed by special ops in the enemy rear
Their special ops units would be a PITA but are not enough in of themselves to be decisive. I would use them against American/ROK airbases if I was the North Koreans but even that is only going to delay the inevitable -- and special ops won't be much use against aircraft carriers or our bases in Japan.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
30,000 lbs? Does it have to explode at all when dropped from a plane?
They used them for psyops in Afghanistan. Had some Taliban holed up in a valley, some spec ops team called for fire support. So the B-1s fly through the valley supersonic while dropping bombs... and hitting everything with its sonic boom. The spec ops dudes said 'I knew that was coming, and I still shit my pants' or something to that affect.
Anyhow, the B1's bombbays are probably too small in one dimension to fit the MOP.
I was going for a reference to this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ueuauKKjPZI
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
First, I don't trust the USSBS conclusions. The US Army Air Force had a lot of incentive to show that the non-nuclear strategic bombing worked, and it's one survey's opinion lacking a good deal of modern scholarship. Further, the Japanese had incentive to hold on and see how the next accepted strategy (make invading the Home Islands prohibitively expensive) worked.
Second, the US knew that the Japanese were interested in a peace based on the status quo, and evacuation (on Japanese terms) of Japanese-occupied areas, with Japan to try its own war criminals. The Allies did not find this acceptable, and it would likely have resulted in massive casualties in China, the East Indies, and other highly populated Japanese-held areas. Heck, Unit 631 released plague-bearing rats in Manchuria as they moved out.
Third, the US knew that any attempts to negotiate something the Allies might possibly accept were being shot down by the Japanese government. The Japanese asked the Soviets about being a go-between for proposals, and never followed up on that. The Japanese ambassador to the Soviet Union urged the Japanese government to accept any possible terms, including the Potsdam Declaration ones (which were the ones imposed), and was told not to pursue that. Read Downfall, by Richard Frank, for a good account of what the US knew at the time.
Fourth, my best estimates are that the Japanese were killing between one hundred thousand and two hundred thousand Chinese civilians a month, in various ways. I have no reason to believe this was much diminished in 1945. That means that about two months of additional occupation of China would cause roughly as many deaths, likely more, as the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This does not count other highly populated areas.
Fifth, the Japanese were singularly unprepared for winter, having massive economic disruption and crop failures. Any delay in Japanese surrender was going to kill a whole lot of Japanese, and I've seen precisely no claims that the Japanese were going to surrender almost immediately as a result of US action without the nukes. Remember that any areas occupied by the Soviets were in real trouble because of this.
Sixth, the Japanese government was preparing to throw the entire local population into invasion defense. Schoolgirls were being trained with bamboo spears. The civilian casualties in an Allied invasion would have been extremely high, vastly greater than those from the nuclear bombings. Note that "Allied" here includes the Soviet Union, which was making plans to invade the northernmost home island. They weren't very good at this oceanic invasion stuff (compare the problems invading the Kuriles islands), but they would have made a fairly large part of Hokkaido into a battlefield.
These are some of the reasons why I think the nuclear bombs were the right thing to do. Dropping them probably resulted in a net lessening of Japanese civilian deaths, and virtually certainly a lessening of overall civilian deaths. There was perhaps a better course of action, but we can't be at all sure of that even now, and I don't criticize historical decisions unless I know something would have been better.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
First off, let me make point you to what I actually said:
N. Korea (sic) truly IS a threat to the US and it's allies.
You attack an ally of the US, and you are attacking the US... period.
Chemical weapons:
http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUST32127420090618
Don't like Reuters?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/this_world/3440771.stm
Don't like the BBC?
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia-pacific/2009/07/20097165415127287.html
They have had the ACTUAL (not imagined, like Iraq) capability to build and explode a nuclear device.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/may/25/north-korea-hiroshima-nuclear-test
Last, but certainly NOT least Delivery technology: (from Wiki)
# Nodong-1 â" larger and more advanced Scud modification. Liquid-fueled, road-mobile missile with a 650 kg warhead. First production variants had inertial guidance, later variants featured GPS guidance, which improves CEP accuracy to 190â"250 m.[43] Range is estimated to be between 1,300 and 1,600 km.
# Nodong-2 â" further improved variant of the Nodong-1, successfully tested in 2006. Range is estimated at about 2,000 km.
# Taepodong-1 â" two-stage Scud-derived missile. Has been tested with a satellite payload in 1998. The satellite failed, but the missile apparently flew without significant problems, therefore it is North Korea's longest-ranged operational missile with its 2,500 km maximum range. According to some analysts, the Taepodong-1 could have an intercontinental range of nearly 6,000 km with a third stage and a payload of less than 100 kg.[44][45]
# Musudan-1 â" a modified copy of the Soviet R-27 Zyb SLBM. No tests of this missile have ever been made, but it is known to be operationally deployed. Most probably it is used as a first stage to the Taepodong-2. The missile, also known under the names Nodong-B, Taepodong-X and BM25, has a range of 4,000 kilometers.
# Taepodong-2 â" North Korea's domestic ICBM attempt. First test occurred in 2006, when the missile failed 40 seconds after launch. On April 5, 2009, a space booster variant was launched with a satellite on board. As with in 1998, the satellite itself failed to reach orbit, but the missile flew several thousand kilometers before falling in the Pacific Ocean. Estimates of the range vary widely â" from 4,500 to 10,000 kilometers (most estimates put the range at about 6,700 km).
I'm not going to bother with multiple citations, since if you haven't started investigating on your own, then you're a zealot, and no amount of facts will convince you.
One of these days I'm going to cut you into little pieces. - PF