Ramon Lopez/WASHINGTON DC
A US weapon still under development and designed to attack deep underground bunkers containing command and control centres and weapons of mass destruction (WMD) was secretly and successfully deployed against Yugoslav targets in the Kosovo theatre of operations, according to US Air Force officials.
Flight International has learned that the 900kg (2,000lb) Lockheed Martin BLU-116B Advanced Unitary Penetrator (AUP) warhead was used to attack unspecified targets in Yugoslavia with the Alliant Techsystems FMU-157B Hard Target Smart Fuze (HTSF) for burst point optimisation.
Officials say that five AUPs were shipped to the theatre. The type of aircraft used to deliver the weapons is unknown, but the AUP is certificated for use only with the USAF's Boeing F-15E Eagle and the US Navy's Boeing F/A-18 Hornet strike aircraft.
The AUP is virtually identical to the combat-proven BLU-109 - a 900kg hard-target attack warhead used by the USAF and USN - but the advanced warhead can penetrate over twice the thickness of reinforced concrete.
The BLU-109 arms the Raytheon GBU-24 and GBU-27 laser-guided bombs, the Boeing GBU-15 and AGM-130 guided stand-off weapons and the Boeing Joint Direct Attack Munition.
Lockheed Martin received a USAF contract in 1995 to develop the AUP as an upgrade to the BLU-109 penetrator warhead, which was used successfully in the 1991 Gulf War.
Government and industry sources say that, over the next five years, the USN will acquire 400-600 GBU-24s armed with AUPs.
A 450kg variant of the AUP and the British Aerospace Broach warhead, which combines an initial penetrating charge with a secondary follow-through bomb, are being considered for a version of the Boeing AGM-86D conventional air-launched cruise missile (CALCM) with a penetrator warhead. The current AGM-86C is armed with an 800kg-class blast-fragmentation warhead.
The USAF will decide soon the outcome of the penetrating warhead shoot-off, and determine whether to field such a variant of CALCM.
Source: Flight International
