Exclusive: Early US intel assessment suggests strikes on Iran did not destroy nuclear sites, sources say | CNN Politics
Exclusive: Early US intel assessment suggests strikes on Iran did not destroy nuclear sites, sources say | CNN Politics
The US military strikes on three of Iran’s nuclear facilities last weekend did not destroy the core components of the country’s nuclear program and likely only set it back by months, according to an early US intelligence assessment that was described by seven people briefed on it.
You're viewing a single thread.
The US military has said the operation went as planned and that it was an “overwhelming success.”
Just to be clear, that can be true and the mission failed to do more than set Iran back a few months. They can have destroyed the targets they were told to destroy (success), but the targets may have been wrong or incomplete. Or, as the article suggests, the bombs landed where they were supposed to, but didn't penetrate underground enough to do the damage desired.
the mission failed to do more than set Iran back a few months
Iran. Doesn't. Have. A. Nuclear. Weapons. Program.
They have repeatedly presented evidence to this effect to multiple watchdog groups. They have had over 30 years to build a bomb and have declined to do so. The idea that this "set Iran back" is predicated on the theory that they were ever engaged in a project to build a weapon like this.
The dirty truth of the matter is that Israel does not want Iran to access clean, cheap, highly efficient nuclear power for purely economic reasons. They don't want an Iranian industrial revolution that might put the country on par with Germany or Japan or Brazil or China. Keeping the Iranians trapped in the 1930s, technologically, is a part of a broader effort to strangle the Middle East (and Africa and the South Pacific states) and keep them yoked to the post-industrial Western economy as a source of cheap materials and cheap labor.
What? Iran already has a nuclear power plant with a 2nd one beginning construction in 2019 and a 3rd one planned. And the International Atomic Energy Agency had reported that Iran was not complying with their inspectors on numerous occasions: https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/06/1164291
So wtf are you talking about?
I'm not saying they have/had nukes, but your story is just completely made up.
So wtf are you talking about?
Nuclear power is very different from nuclear weapons.
And the International Atomic Energy Agency had reported that Iran was not complying with their inspectors on numerous occasions
This was the same manufactured story that the US used to invade Iraq. Cherry picking disputes between the IAEA and the Iranian energy ministry to justify a massacre of civilian scientists and civilians caught in the crossfire? Why are Americans so ready to throw away the lives of every other global citizen?
your story is just completely made up
The crusade by Netanyahu to provoke an invasion and massacre of Iranians is exhaustively well-documented. The US-lead effort to sanction Iran and cripple its economy, following the '79 revolution is exhaustively well-documented. From the Project For The New American Century, championed by Neocon wunderkind Bill Kristol to the Project 2025 authored by JD Vance, the goal of crippling Iran's economy and fomenting revolution domestically as a prelude to invasion has been laid out in excruciating detail.
I'm not arguing Israel's or the US's intent to destroy the Iranian government (and, for the record, the Iranian government is definitely shitty, even a notable portion of their population loathes it as well). That Israel--and the current US administration--has been wanting to attack Iran for any reason, even if the reason is dubious, is not in question.
What I'm arguing is that you said this was all to prevent Iran to have nuclear energy, which is untrue since Iran already has that. And it is also undeniable that Iran has not been complying with the IAEA's inspectors since 2019. Why would the IAEA report that Iran is enriching uranium beyond what is needed for energy? Why is Iran not complying with their inspectors?
Those are questions worth asking and seeking the answers to. I do not agree they should be outright attacked over such things, but to pretend like Iran is completely innocent is ridiculous. It's unfortunate that genocidal war criminals are running Israel and a corrupt group of fascists is running the US at the moment, but it is unsurprising that they are not seeking to resolve these issues peacefully.
What I’m arguing is that you said this was all to prevent Iran to have nuclear energy, which is untrue since Iran already has that.
They have a single nuclear plant that had been under construction since 1975 and was held up repeatedly by foreign intervention, including the 2009 sabotage effort by the Obama administration's CIA - which, incidentally, gave the rest of the world exposure to the Stuxnet virus as collateral. Then there has been the persistent effort by US and Israeli intelligence services to kidnap and assassinate Iranian nuclear scientists, also going back decades. Not even including the assassination efforts since 2021, we've seen attacks in 2007, 2009, 2010, and 2011 all linked back to western aligned governments.
"Iran has a single nuclear power plant so what are you complaining about?" is deliberately naive and obtuse, particularly when peer nations like Germany and France have enjoyed the benefits of between six and fifty-six plants going back over 40 years. Hell, the UAE has four active plants and over 5x Iran's total energy capacity for a population 1/10th the size, without provoking the kind of intervention and assault the Iranians have endured.
The latest bombing of uranium enrichment facilities - hell, the fact that they need to bury their refinement facilities at the bottom of a mountain to begin with - illustrate the undo costs and constant threats Iranians need to endure in order to modernize their electric grids.
I do not agree they should be outright attacked over such things, but to pretend like Iran is completely innocent is ridiculous.
Innocent of what? Implementing energy modernization strategies that have been in the works since prior to the revolution?
What are you even accusing them of? Not adhering to an arms control agreement the US pulled out of as an excuse to attack them? It's insane to even talk about the Iranian nuclear program absent the malicious history of foreign intervention.
Again, you're ignoring that the IAEA's entire purpose is non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. Why deny compliance to third-party inspectors? If their endeavors were truly so innocent, then they had no reason to be uncooperative.
Sorry, I will not feel pity towards the Iranian government. I sympathize for their people, but their government can shove off.
the IAEA’s entire purpose is non-proliferation of nuclear weapons
Oh? How many inspections have they made in Israel?
Sorry, I will not feel pity towards the Iranian government.
Of course not. Your brain is poisoned by hate.
Oh I'm sorry, the Iranian government hasn't violently put down any female civil rights movements there?
Is that why we bombed them
They were complying with the JCPOA, according to the IAEA, up until at least early 2019, despite Trump killing the agreement years prior.
Yes, I pointed that out in an earlier response.
Iran was complying with the JCPOA before Trump killed it in his first term simply because Obama did it. And even then, they continued to comply with these limits and the IAEA inspections up until, at least, early 2019.
You know there is a difference between a bomb and a power plant, right?
I think trump would immediately throw a company under the bus for their "weak loser bombs" if they didn't perform as designed.
I think trump would immediately "you're fired" a general for spec-ing the wrong bombs.I think the intel was wrong
I think the intel was wrong
The intel said that Iran was not developing nuclear weapons. The strikes happened because Trump decided to ignore the intel in favor of the random imaginings in his head, and no doubt Netanyahu encouraged him.
I think we agree.
The intel trump used to order the strikes was wrong... The intel was wrong.
Presuming the buck stops with the president of course.I doubt he actually cared enough about any briefing material. He probably went in with the mentality of "Iran is developing nukes, and should be stopped" then asked for intel according to that presumption.
No he wouldn't. Pretending it was successful is 100% within his M.O.