This is the first public display of the bomb, according to the report.
The weapon is so large that a bomber can only carry one at a time, the Global Times said. The report describes it as China’s most powerful non-nuclear bomb.
The Global Times report boasted that China’s new weapon could completely destroy even fortified targets.
The Chinese bomb and its U.S. predecessor are similar not only in terms of their names, but also in their usage—the bombs are so large that they can only be dropped individually.
Bombs known as Daisy Cutters were used in the Vietnam War by the U.S. military, meant to clear sections of forest to create helicopter landing zones. Retired in 2008, they came as a precursor to MOABs.
Russia also developed a large, non-nuclear thermobaric bomb in 2007, nicknamed the “Father of all Bombs.” Thermobaric weapons, also called fuel-air bombs or vacuum bombs, create intense heat and a devastating shockwave by setting the air itself on fire.
The American MOAB isn’t a thermobaric bomb and neither is the new Chinese weapon presented in the video, according to a Norinco representative.