The US military on Thursday dropped what is considered to be the largest non-nuclear bomb on an ISIS complex in Afghanistan, the Pentagon said. The GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast bomb hit a “tunnel complex” in Achin district in Nangarhar province in Afghanistan, US Forces said in a statement.
The strike occurred around 7.32 pm local time. Pentagon spokesman Adam Stump said it was the first combat use of the weapon.
Stump said the bomb contains 11 tonnes of explosives. The Air Force calls it the Massive Ordnance Air Blast bomb. Based on the acronym, it has been nicknamed the “Mother Of All Bombs”.
Stump says the bomb was dropped on a cave complex believed to be used by ISIS fighters in the Achin district of Nangarhar province, very close to the border with Pakistan.
The bomb, which was developed during the
Iraq war, is the US’ largest non-nuclear bomb and had not been deployed on the battlefield until now. It weighs 21,000 pounds. The bomb’s deployment comes just a few days after a US Special Forces operator was killed in the same region of the country during operations against ISIS.
The US and NATO war in Afghanistan will enter its 16th year in 2017.
The US has deployed heavy ordnance in the country before. In November 2001, during the initial invasion of Afghanistan, the US dropped “daisy cutter” bombs — which weighed 15,000 pounds and were first used to clear helicopter landing zones in the jungles of Vietnam — on Taliban positions.