Washington – One of the three nuclear enrichment sites in Iran attacked by the United States last month was mostly destroyed, delaying work significantly there. But the other two were not so damaged and they may have degraded only to a point where nuclear enrichment could be resumed in the coming months if Iran wishes, according to a recent evaluation of the destruction caused by the military operation, five current and former American officials familiar with the evaluation told the NBC News.
The evaluation, part of the continuous efforts of the Trump Administration to determine the state of the Iran’s nuclear program since the facilities were beaten, some legislators in the United States, officials of the Department of Defense and allied countries in recent days, were reported, said four people.
NBC News also learned that the US Central Command had developed a much more comprehensive plan to attack Iran that would have involved hitting three additional sites in an operation that would have extended for several weeks instead of one night, according to a current US official and two former US officials.
President Donald Trump was informed about that plan, but was rejected because he disagreed with his foreign policy instincts extract the United States from conflicts abroad, not deepen them, as well as the possibility of a large number of victims on both sides, one of the current officials and one of the former officials said.
“We were willing to go in our options, but the president did not want to,” said one of the sources with knowledge of the plan.
In a speech in the hours after they took place, Trump described the attacks that directed “a spectacular military success” and said: “The key enrichment facilities of Iran have been completely erased.”
The reality made through intelligence until now seems to be more nuanced. And if the first findings about the damage inflicted on Iran’s nuclear program remain as more intelligence enters, the United States could be again in a conflict there.
There have been discussions within the American and Israeli governments about whether additional strikes could be necessary on the two less damaged facilities if Iran does not accept to restart negotiations with the Trump administration in a nuclear agreement or if there are signs that Iran are trying to rebuild in those places, one of the current officials and one of the former officials said. Iran has long said that its nuclear program is purely for peaceful civil purposes.
The recent evaluation is a snapshot of the damage that US attacks inflicted in the midst of an intelligence collection process that is expected to continue administration officials for months. Iran’s nuclear program evaluations are expected after the US strikes change over time, and according to two of the current officials, as the process progresses, the findings suggest more damage than the previous evaluations revealed. This evaluation remains for now the current thought about the impact of strikes, authorities said.
“As the president has said and experts have verified, Operation Midnight Hammer destroyed Iran’s nuclear capabilities,” said White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly, A NBC News in a statement. “The United States and the world are safer, thanks to its decisive action.”
In his own statement, the spokesman of the Pentagon Chief Sean Parnell said: “The credibility of the false media is similar to that of the current state of the Iranian nuclear facilities: destroyed, on Earth, and will take years to recover. President Trump was clear and American people understand: Iran’s nuclear facilities in Fordow, Isfahan and Natanzon were completely and completely obliterated. doubts.
He added: “The Midnight Hammer operation was a significant blow for Iran’s nuclear capabilities thanks to President Trump’s decisive action and the courage of each man and woman in uniform who supported this mission.”
Destruction and deterrence
American strikes attacked three enrichment sites in Iran: Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan. American officials believe that the attack on Fordo, which for a long time has been seen as a critical component of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, succeeded in delaying Iranian enrichment capabilities in that site for up to two years, according to two of the current officials.
Much of the public messages of the administration on strikes have focused on Fordo. In an informative session of the Pentagon, they kept in response to an initial evaluation of the Defense Intelligence Agency that concluded that Iran’s nuclear program had been retreated for only three to six months, for example, the Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth and General Dan Caine, the president of the Joint General Staff, spoke extensively about the attack in Fordo, but not the Strikes in Natanz and Isfahan.
American officials knew before the air attacks that Iran had structures and uranium enriched in Natanz and Isfahan who were probably out of reach of the GBU-57 bombs “Bunker Buster” of 30,000 pounds from the United States, three of the sources said. These bombs, which had never been used in combat before strikes, were designed with the deeply buried facilities carved on the side of a mountain in Fordo in mind.
However, already in 2023, there were indications that Iran was digging tunnels in Natanz that were below where the GBU-57 could reach. There are also deep tunnels underground in Isfahan. The United States reached surface objectives in Isfahan with Tomahawk missiles and did not drop GBU-57 there, but used them in Natanz.
White House officials pointed to NBC News to an informative session of closed doors held at the end of June by the CIA director, John Ratcliffe, who told the legislators that Iran’s nuclear program was “severely damaged” and that several key nuclear facilities were “completely destroyed”, according to the description of an official of the Information Administration. Ratcliffe said that the only metal conversion center in Natanz, required for nuclear enrichment, was destroyed to the point that it would have been rebuilding for years, “according to a White House official who was authorized to describe some contents of the classified informative session.
Ratcliffe also said that the intelligence community believes that the attacks buried the vast majority of the enriched uranium in Isfahan and Fordo and that, therefore, it would be extremely difficult for the Iranians to extract it to resume enrichment, according to the official. The United States has not seen indications that Iran is trying to dig up the facilities, two officials said.
As NBC News has reported, the Israeli government believes that at least part of Iran’s highly enriched uranium remains intact but buried under Isfahan’s installation, according to a senior Israeli government official who informed journalists in Washington last week. The official said, however, that Israel considers the material effectively unattainable, because it is observing and carrying out new strikes if you think Iran is trying to dig up uranium. The official also said that Israel believes that Iran’s nuclear program has been retreated for up to two years.
Similarly, even if Iranian nuclear sites were not completely destroyed, US officials and republican defenders of the operation believe it was a success because the strategic equation for Iran has changed. From his point of view, the regime in Tehran now faces a credible threat of more air attacks if Israel and the United States believe that he is trying to revive clandestine nuclear work.
He asked at the end of last month if he would consider bombing Iran again if the intelligence reports concluded that Iran can enrich Uranium at a level that worries him, Trump said: “Of course. Without a doubt. Absolutely.”
Iran’s aerial defenses have been largely destroyed, which makes it all impossible that they will defend against more strikes in the facilities in the future, said the White House official.
“It was clarified that Iran no longer has [air defenses]So, the idea that they can easily rebuild anything is ridiculous, ”said the White House official.
The ‘All-in’ Plan
Starting during the Biden administration, already in the past fall and in this spring, the general of the Army Erik Kurilla, the head of the US Central Command. Uu., Had developed a plan to go to “all inclusive” to hit Iran, according to a current US official and two former officials. That option was designed to “truly tithe” Iran’s nuclear capabilities, in the words of one of the former officials.
According to the plan, the United States would have reached six sites. The idea was that the six sites would have to be repeatedly beaten to inflict the type of damage necessary to completely finish the program, people familiar with thought said. The Plan would also have involved pointing to more Air Defense capabilities of Iran and Balistic Missiles, and planners project that it could result in a large amount of Iranian casualties. American officials expected that if that took place, they would go to US positions, for example, in Iraq and Syria, said a person familiar with the plan.
“It would be a prolonged aerial campaign,” said the person.
Some Trump administration officials believed that a deeper offensive option against Iran was a viable policy, two of the former officials said.
Trump was informed about the so-called All-In Plan, but was ultimately rejected because he would have required a sustained conflict period.
The story
During his first term, in 2018, Trump took the United States from a 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and the world powers that was negotiated during the Obama administration. The agreement, known as the Joint Integral Action Plan, imposed strict limits on the Iran Nuclear Program in exchange for a flexibility of economic sanctions.
According to the agreement, Iran was one year after obtaining enough physifible material for a nuclear pump. After Trump withdrew from the agreement and reimposed sanctions, they will reduce the restrictions on their uranium enrichment. Before the air attacks in June, the regime had sufficient fistible material for approximately nine to 10 bombs, according to US officials and inspectors of the United Nations.
Since then, Trump has sought a new agreement with Iran that will prevent him from developing nuclear weapons. Indirect conversations between US and Iranian officials could not ensure an agreement before Israel launched air attacks in Iran’s nuclear facilities.
Iran has denied for a long time that he wants to build a nuclear weapon, a position that reiterated his Minister of Foreign Affairs in an interview with NBC News the day before the United States.
