On Thursday morning the USA they announced that bombers were used B-2 Stealth for raids on weapons storage facilities of Houthia “satellite” of Tehran, in the shadow of the imminent Israeli attack on Iran.

“These actions,” the US military emphasized, “were taken to degrade the ability of the Houthis to continue their reckless and unlawful attacks on international merchant shipping and on US, coalition and merchant personnel and ships in the Red Sea, in the Bab Al-Madeb Strait and the Gulf of Aden, undermining their ability to threaten regional partners.”

“This was a unique demonstration of the US’s ability to target facilities that our adversaries are trying to keep at bay, no matter how deep underground, hardened or fortified they are,” US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement. . “The deployment of US Air Force B-2 Spirit long-range stealth bombers demonstrates US global capabilities to take action against these targets when necessary, anytime, anywhere,” he said.

It is noted that it was the first time that the US used the strategic stealth bomber to attack Yemen. The B-2 is a much larger platform than the fighter jets that have been used so far to target Houthi installations and weapons, capable of carrying a much larger bomb load.

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The Northrop B-2 Spirit, also known as the Stealth Bomber, is an American heavy strategic bomber that uses low-detection technology to penetrate dense anti-aircraft defenses.

The “flying wing” type aircraft has a crew of two and was designed by Northrop (later Northrop Grumman), with Boeing, Hughes and Vought as the main subcontractors. It was produced from 1987-2000 and can drop both conventional and thermonuclear weapons, including up to 80 500-pound Mk 82 JDAM bombs or 16 B83 nuclear bombs.

Development of the B-2 began during the Advanced Technology Bomber (ATB) program during the Carter administration, which canceled the B-1A bomber program as the ATB showed great promise.

The B-2 can launch attacks from an altitude of 50,000 feet (15,000 meters) and has a range of 6,000 nautical miles (11,000 km) without refueling, while with refueling it can fly over 10,000 nautical miles (19,000 km). The aircraft entered service in 1997 and was originally designed for nuclear strikes, but was first used in combat with conventional weapons in the 1999 Kosovo War, and later in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya.

The US Air Force currently has 19 active B-2s, with one destroyed in 2008 and another in 2022. The plan is for them to remain in service until 2032, when they will be replaced by the Northrop Grumman B-21 Raider.