If Iran goes nuclear, B-2 bomber will get the call

Iran is “not seeking nuclear weapons,” President Masoud Pezeshkian claimed on February 6. Ha! No one believed him, because the UN says Iran is within weeks of producing enough enriched uranium for a handful of bombs. By the way, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz was briefed on this risk by his predecessor Jake Sullivan.  

If that day comes when Iran is too close to a bomb, there is one U.S. warplane that will get the call: the B-2 Spirit stealth bomber. Only the B-2 has the survivability and payload to target deeply buried weapons sites.  

Iran’s terror apparatus is weaker due to Israel’s attacks, but their nuclear ambitions are stronger than ever. Iran began enriching uranium to 60% back in 2021, and it is the only country enriching to that level that does not have a nuclear weapon.  

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Former Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in August that Iran was “probably one to two weeks away” from enriching to the 90% required to construct a nuclear device. UN inspectors visiting Iran in November confirmed that Iran was feeding more partially enriched uranium into the cascades of two centrifuges at its Fordow nuclear plant south of Tehran.  

The trigger moment comes if Iran assembles a bomb. The problem? A “a big part of the nuclear program in Iran is underground and very well protected,” Rafael Grossi, director general of the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said on Dec. 6. “So kinetic action against the program would require a vast deployment of force,” Grossi explained. 

You need vast force, you call the B-2, which first saw combat in the 1999 war against Serbia. Only 21 B-2s were ever built, and the Air Force still operates 19 from Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri.   

I’ve flown in the B-2 bomber, on a beautiful summer afternoon over Missouri, and it’s otherworldly. Note to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth: put yourself on the list for a B-2 flight ASAP! 

A pure flying wing without a straight fuselage, the B-2 is basically one giant bomb bay attached to a 172-foot wing, with a sawtooth trailing edge. You can’t see the engines, although four are packed into its innards. Nothing hangs off the wings. In combat stealth mode, antennae and running lights tuck away. The B-2’s flying wing shape, curved surfaces, and radar-absorbent material coatings are calculated to spoof enemy air defense fire control radars. While flat metal surfaces reflect back a huge amount of energy to scanning enemy radars, the stealth B-2 absorbs, dissipates and sends the radar return off in different directions.  

B-2s can fly for two days straight. The B-2 can take off from the USA, conduct bombing missions in the Middle East, and return home, assisted by aerial refueling tankers that deliver fuel at over 1,000 gallons per minute. 

Only the B-2 carries a 30,000-lb. bomb known as the GBU-57 (which stands for guided bomb unit.)  The GBU-57 is packed with a blend of advanced propellant-like, plastic bonded explosives developed by the Air Force to be highly energetic and less sensitive to shock: the essentials for destroying deeply buried, hardened targets.  

To destroy a potential Iranian nuclear weapons production line, it will take carefully timed, precise, heavy munitions to penetrate earth and concrete, collapse and crater the facility. Guarantee your targeting options have already been drawn up, and the intelligence and tactics are assessed and updated regularly. Each B-2 will be assigned multiple aimpoints for a crushing blow.  

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In fact, that’s one reason the B-2 hit buried weapons storage targets in Yemen in October. According to the Pentagon, this was also “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. The employment of U.S. Air Force B-2 Spirit long-range stealth bombers demonstrate [sic] U.S. global strike capabilities to take action against these targets when necessary, anytime, anywhere,” said a Pentagon release Oct. 16. That’s you, Iran.  

B-2 stealth bombers would be the weapon of choice if the U.S. had to knock out Iran’s nuclear capability. (Christian Petersen/Getty Images)

Other aircraft would be in support, including F/A-18s and F-35s from a carrier airwing, and land-based F-35s, F-22s and F-16s. The F-15 could also carry the GBU-72, a 5,000-lb. weapon tested by the U.S. Air Force in 2021. Israel has already employed the older GBU-28 bunker-buster, so they may join in.  

What if Iran actually launches a nuclear weapon? We saw a rehearsal of that unthinkable scenario in 2024. In April, Iran launched medium-range ballistic missiles toward Israel. In response, U.S. Navy destroyers USS Arleigh Burke and USS Carney launching their own Standard Missile-3s into the exo-atmosphere. Against the cold background of space, the SM-3s picked up the heat signature of the Iranian missile warheads and intercepted them using a hit-to-kill technique.  

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The stakes would be even higher with a nuclear warhead. Best case: an exo-atmospheric kill in mid-course, smashing the nuclear warhead to smithereens before detonation. Worst case: an EMP burst, with electric and magnetic pulses frying electronics, the power grid, communications and other critical infrastructure over a wide area.  

You can see why Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. America’s B-2 stealth bomber stands ready to make sure it never happens.  

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