US Has Bombed Iran - Where Do We go From Here

[Suliso]

Those Iranian strikes were purely performative to save face domestically. They fired 6-12 missiles and told beforehand when and where will they go. Of course they were shot down.

I have a half Iranian colleague at work who's on top of such things.

[Owendonovan]

June 23, 2025, 8:19 p.m. ETJust now
Ronen Bergman

While Israel has not yet confirmed President Trump’s cease-fire announcement, Israeli Air Force jets — possibly anticipating that such a declaration will be made soon — are striking dozens of targets in Tehran and other parts of the country according to two Israeli defense officials.


Live Updates: Trump Says Cease-Fire Is Imminent; No Word From Iran or Israel
The president’s assertion on social media came hours after an Iranian missile attack on the largest American military installation in the Middle East, and days after U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.

Updated
June 23, 2025, 7:40 p.m. ET39 minutes ago
Farnaz FassihiJonathan SwanRonen BergmanAaron Boxerman and Adam Rasgon

Here’s the latest.

President Trump said on social media on Monday that Israel and Iran had agreed to a cease-fire after more than a week of missile strikes on each other and a weekend attack on Iranian nuclear facilities by American bombers. There was no immediate confirmation of a deal by Israel or Iran.

Mr. Trump’s assertion came hours after Iran launched missiles at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, the largest American military installation in the Middle East, retaliating for U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear sites though taking steps to limit the damage.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/06/23 ... =url-share

Gift Link

Seems Iran and Israel are ignoring his "cease-fire".

[dryrunguy]

Is anyone else... confuzzled?

[ti-amie]

He wants a Nobel Prize.

Carl Quintanilla
‪@carlquintanilla.bsky.social‬
CNN: “.. likely only set it back by months, according to an early US intelligence assessment ..”

@cnn.com

www.cnn.com/2025/06/24/p...

[dryrunguy]

That link doesn't work, Amie. But I loved this bit from the NY Times in their breaking email:

"The report suggests that President Trump’s earlier statement on the strike’s success was overstated."

Surely you jest.

"And don't call me Shirley." ~ Leslie Nielsen

[ti-amie]

That link doesn't work, Amie. But I loved this bit from the NY Times in their breaking email:

"The report suggests that President Trump’s earlier statement on the strike’s success was overstated."

Surely you jest.

"And don't call me Shirley." ~ Leslie Nielsen

This applies to both CNN taking down the story and the NYTimes report

[ti-amie]

Strike Set Back Iran’s Nuclear Program by Only a Few Months, U.S. Report Says
Classified findings indicate that the attack sealed off the entrances to two facilities but did not collapse their underground buildings.
By Julian E. BarnesHelene CooperEric SchmittRonen BergmanMaggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan

Reporting from Washington

June 24, 2025, 3:20 p.m. ET

A preliminary classified U.S. report says the American bombing of Iran’s nuclear sites sealed off the entrances to two of the facilities but did not collapse their underground buildings, according to officials familiar with the findings.

The early findings conclude that the strikes over the weekend set back Iran’s nuclear program by only a few months, the officials said.

Before the attack, U.S. intelligence agencies had said that if Iran tried to rush to making a bomb, it would take about three months. After the U.S. bombing run and days of attacks by the Israeli Air Force, the report by the Defense Intelligence Agency estimated that the program was delayed less than six months.

Former officials said that any rushed effort by Iran to get a bomb would be to develop a relatively small and crude device. A miniaturized warhead would be far more difficult to produce, and it is not clear how much damage to that more advanced research has taken place.

The findings suggest that President Trump’s statement that Iran’s nuclear facilities were obliterated was overstated, at least based on the initial damage assessment. Congress had been set to be briefed on the strike on Tuesday, and lawmakers were expected to ask about the findings of the assessment, but the session was postponed. Senators are now set be briefed on Thursday.

The report also said much of Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium was moved before the strikes, which destroyed little of the nuclear material. Some of that may have been moved to secret nuclear sites maintained by Iran.

Some Israeli officials said they also believe that Iran has maintained small covert enrichment facilities that were built so the Iranian government could continue its nuclear program in the event of an attack on the larger facilities.

Officials cautioned that the five-page classified report is only an initial assessment, and others will follow as more information is collected and as Iran examines the three sites at Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan. One official said that the reports people in the administration had been shown were “mixed” but that more assessments were yet to be done.

But the Defense Intelligence Agency report indicates that the sites were not damaged as much as some administration officials had hoped, and that Iran retains control of almost all of its nuclear material, meaning if it decides to make a nuclear weapon it might still be able to do so relatively quickly.

Officials interviewed for this article spoke on the condition of anonymity because the findings of the report remain classified.

The White House took issue with the assessment. Karoline Leavitt, a White House spokeswoman, said it was “flat-out wrong.”

“The leaking of this alleged assessment is a clear attempt to demean President Trump, and discredit the brave fighter pilots who conducted a perfectly executed mission to obliterate Iran’s nuclear program,” she said in a statement. “Everyone knows what happens when you drop 14 30,000-pound bombs perfectly on their targets: total obliteration.”

Elements of the intelligence report were reported earlier by CNN.

The strikes badly damaged the electrical system at Fordo, which is housed deep inside a mountain to shield it from attacks, officials said. It is not clear how long it will take Iran to gain access to the underground buildings and then repair the electrical systems and reinstall equipment that was moved.

Initial Israeli damage assessments have also raised questions of the effectiveness of the strikes. Israeli defense officials said they have also collected evidence that the underground facilities at Fordo were not destroyed.

Before the strike, the U.S. military gave officials a range of possibilities for how much the attack could set back the Iranian program. Those ranged from a few months on the low end to years on the higher end.

Some officials cautioned that such estimates are imprecise, and that it is impossible to know how long Iran would exactly take to rebuild, if it chose to do so.

Mr. Trump has declared that B-2 bombing raids and Navy Tomahawk missile strikes “obliterated” the three Iranian nuclear sites, an assertion that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth repeated at a Pentagon news conference on Sunday.

But Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has been more careful in describing the attack’s effects.

“This operation was designed to severely degrade Iran’s nuclear weapons infrastructure,” General Caine said that at the Sunday news conference.

The final battle damage assessment for the military operation against Iran, General Caine said on Sunday, standing next to Mr. Hegseth, was still to come. He said the initial assessment showed that all three of the Iranian nuclear sites that were struck “sustained severe damage and destruction.”

At a Senate hearing on Monday, Democrats also struck a more cautionary note in challenging Mr. Trump’s assessment.

“We still await final battle damage assessments,” said Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the senior Democrat on the Armed Services Committee.

Military officials had said that to do more significant damage to the underground sites, they would have to be hit with multiple strikes. But Mr. Trump announced he would stop the strikes after approving the first wave.

U.S. intelligence agencies had concluded before the strikes that Iran had not made the decision to make a nuclear weapon, but possessed enough enriched uranium that if it decided to make a bomb, it could do so relatively quickly.

While intelligence officials had predicted that a strike on Fordo or other nuclear facilities by the United States could prompt Iran to make a bomb, U.S. officials said they do not know yet if Iran would do so.

Representatives of the Defense Intelligence Agency did not respond to requests for comment.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/24/us/p ... sites.html

[ti-amie]

Expletive in.


Full video via NYTimes.
https://www.nytimes.com/video/embedded/ ... =url-share

Now imagine Presidents Biden or Obama doing this.

[dave g]

Is anyone else... confuzzled?

This is only confusing if you think President Trump both knows the truth and speaks the truth.

[ti-amie]

‪Carl Quintanilla‬ ‪@carlquintanilla.bsky.social‬
· 33m
>
@wsj.com

[dryrunguy]

Is anyone else... confuzzled?

This is only confusing if you think President Trump both knows the truth and speaks the truth.

I should clarify. Trump is the part I understand. (Good god, that's frightening...) It's the Iranians and Israelis I'm not following. Do we have a cease fire or not? And I don't think we'll really have an answer to that question for a while. And by that time, we could have a completely new conflict for slightly different reasons. Or is could be Israel at war with someone else or Iran at war with someone else and... It all makes my butt hurt from within.

[ti-amie]

Ron Filipkowski
‪@ronfilipkowski.bsky.social‬
Trump canceled the briefing to Congress on the Iran bombings at the last minute and provided no explanation, but the leaked report saying the operation was not as successful as he claimed is definitely fake news because the two things can’t possibly be connected.
June 24, 2025 at 10:18 PM

[ti-amie]

Fate of Iran’s Enriched Uranium Is a Mystery
U.S. intelligence agencies had long assessed that, faced with the possibility of an attack on its nuclear facilities, Iran would try to move its stockpile.


By Julian E. Barnes and David E. Sanger

Julian E. Barnes reported from Washington, and David E. Sanger from The Hague.

June 26, 2025

After days of debate over how severely U.S. strikes had damaged three nuclear facilities in Iran, the fate of the country’s stockpile of enriched uranium remains a bigger mystery.

Over the years, as Iran built up its underground nuclear facilities and centrifuges, it amassed a large, 880-pound stockpile of uranium enriched to 60 percent, near bomb grade.

While U.S. intelligence agencies had assessed that Iran had not decided whether to make a bomb, they noted that Iran was only a few steps away from being able to turn its uranium into a weapon given the size of that stockpile.

There is little doubt that Iran’s entire nuclear program was substantially diminished by U.S. and Israeli strikes, and that it would struggle to quickly produce additional nuclear fuel.

But U.S. intelligence agencies had long assessed that, faced with the possibility of an attack on its nuclear facilities, Iran would try to move its stockpile of enriched uranium, either to keep as leverage in diplomatic negotiations or to use in a race to build a bomb.

In an interview on Sunday, Vice President JD Vance said U.S. officials wanted to talk to Iran about the stockpile. But on Thursday, the Trump administration pushed back on the idea that Iran had been able to move its enriched uranium before the U.S. strike.

President Trump suggested that the stockpile was destroyed or buried by the bombing of the site at Fordo. “Nothing was taken out of facility,” Mr. Trump posted on his social media site. “Would take too long, too dangerous, and very heavy and hard to move!”

And Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said that American intelligence agencies were watching the Iranian nuclear sites closely, “and there was no indication to the United States that any of that enriched uranium was moved prior to the strike.”

American officials say the intelligence collected so far on the stockpile is contradictory.

U.S. intelligence collected on Iranian officials shows they have different understandings of the stockpile’s fate, American officials said.

And parts of the nuclear facility at Natanz where some of the uranium was believed to be held were damaged, but not destroyed, by either the U.S. or Israeli attacks, officials said.

As a result, the intelligence community has not yet made a firm conclusion on how much the Iranians have retained, according to people briefed on the findings.

After a classified Senate briefing on Thursday, Republican lawmakers emphasized that destroying or seizing the stockpile was not part of the U.S. military mission. Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, said the sites were severely damaged but that he “didn’t want people to think the problem is over, because it’s not.”

“I don’t know where the 900 pounds of enriched uranium exists, but it wasn't part of the target set for several years,” Mr. Graham told reporters. “They are obliterated today but they can reconstitute.”

There is confusion also about where the stockpile was originally. Mr. Trump has suggested it was at Fordo. Others have said some was at Natanz. The International Atomic Energy Agency has said the majority of the stockpile was at Isfahan, where Iran had reactors and other nuclear facilities that used the uranium. And some experts have suggested Iran has dispersed the stockpile.

The director general of the I.A.E.A said the Iranians told his inspectors that they planned to move the material if they thought it was under threat. It was stored in containers small enough, he said, to fit into “the trunk of an ordinary car.”

And in the days before the U.S. cruise missile attack on Isfahan, there was evidence of vehicles moving something into or out of those labs. I.A.E.A. officials say that since that stockpile of 60 percent enriched uranium was Iran’s most prized national possession, it would have been a breach of common sense to leave it all in one place.

Rafael Mariano Grossi, the I.A.E.A. director general, has held fast to his view that a good deal of that near-bomb-grade fuel remains in Iranian control. “I don’t know if they moved all of it,” he said this week. “But the evidence points to their moving out a lot of it.”

European officials said on Thursday that their preliminary assessments were also that Iran had moved the stockpile, though officials cautioned that those were early conclusions and that the exact location of the uranium was uncertain.

Other Western officials confirmed the assessment of top American intelligence officials on Wednesday that it could be years before those facilities are fully usable again. Crucially, the centrifuges at Fordo are unlikely to be operable, making it more difficult to purify its stockpile further, according to current and former officials.

In addition to damage to the centrifuges, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, speaking at the NATO summit in The Hague on Wednesday, said the destruction of the “conversion facility” in Isfahan had damaged Iran’s ability to move to a weapon. The facility converts enriched uranium gas into solid materials, and ultimately a metal that can be used to fabricate a nuclear bomb or a warhead.

But while Iran’s overall nuclear program, and ability to produce new fuel, has probably been set back significantly, how quickly the country could produce a bomb is another question.

In nearly two weeks of fighting, Israel killed a number of Iranian nuclear scientists. But if enough have survived, Iran could use a hidden stockpile to race toward a weapon. That would mean Iran’s ability to make a crude bomb was set back only months, even if its larger program suffered graver damage.

Representative Jim Himes of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said the question of the stockpile was critical.

“Obliterating the sites means nothing if the Iranians moved enough 60% uranium, centrifuges and other weaponization tools to build a bomb at some possibly unknown location,” he wrote on social media. “The regime may be vile, but they are not stupid, and this stuff can be relatively easily relocated.

Jonathan Swan contributed reporting from Washington.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/26/us/p ... anium.html

[ti-amie]

[ponchi101]

And the rest of the world says: You had a deal with these guys, you broke it.
Your fault.