US hit Iran’s nukes onerous— but the cheering is – Latest News
One of the most profound threats to world security for the final thirty years or more has suffered a historic setback that may resonate for many years.
In a ruse worthy of World War II’s “Operation Fortitude,” which enabled the D-Day landings, President Donald Trump launched heavy ordnance airstrikes in opposition to Iran’s nuclear weapons program late Saturday — 48 hours after telling the clerical regime he was going to mull his response over the subsequent two weeks.
Overnight, the US Air Force has maybe irreversibly degraded Iran’s drive for the bomb.
U.S. President Donald Trump delivers an tackle to the nation accompanied by U.S. Vice President JD Vance, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S. June 21, 2025, following U.S. strikes on Iran’s nuclear services. REUTERS
It’s tempting to react to the US strikes with unbridled euphoria — but that’s nonetheless untimely.
The subsequent few hours and days will produce a sober battle harm evaluation by each the United States and Israel, detailing the degree of destruction sustained at these services.
That in flip will decide whether or not the badly bruised Iranian regime can embark on a reconstruction effort.
According to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Dan Caine, “Operation Midnight Hammer” unleashed 14 Massive Ordnance Penetrators — “bunker-buster” bombs carrying 30,000-pound payloads — on the three nuclear websites, marking the first time that these had been deployed in an operational setting.
Speaking to reporters Sunday morning, Hegseth mentioned all three services had sustained “extremely severe damage and destruction.”
Aerial view of the Fordow underground complicated in Iran after the American airstrikes. MAXAR Technologies
But neither the Americans nor the Israelis have but confirmed that the Iranian nuclear program has been neutralized fully.
The extent of the destruction of the underground superior centrifuge website at Fordow is nonetheless unclear.
Predictably, in the instant aftermath of the strike, the Iranians vehemently denied that complete harm had been sustained.
Get opinions and commentary from our columnists
Subscribe to our each day Post Opinion publication!
Thanks for signing up!
An Islamic regime official in Qom, the place the facility is situated, insisted that “contrary to the claims of the lying US president, the Fordow nuclear facility has not been seriously damaged, and most of what was damaged was only on the ground, which can be restored.”
Another specific concern is the destiny of more than 400 kilograms of nuclear weapons-grade uranium hid by the regime at Isfahan.
The whereabouts of this stockpile is presently unknown.
Six B-2 Stealth Bombers dropped 12 bunker-buster bombs on the Fordow nuclear website. – Submarines fired 30 Tomahawk missiles from an undisclosed location 400 miles away. Rob Jejenich / NY Post Design
Last week Rafael Grossi, the director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, revealed that the Iranians had informed him the stockpile could possibly be eliminated and positioned beneath “special protective measures” in the occasion of an assault.
“We haven’t been informed of anything in detail,” Grossi mentioned. “We don’t know what these protective additional measures are.”
In addition, an even more deeply buried enrichment website than Fordow, referred to as Pickaxe Mountain, is now beneath construction at Natanz.
It’s not clear how a lot harm that facility — mentioned to be immune from the MOPs dropped on Fordow — sustained in Saturday’s strikes. If it survived, Pickaxe Mountain may enable Iran to reconstitute its nuclear weapons program.
Outside of the nuclear program, important dangers stay on the ground.
The United States has 40,000 troops in the Middle East, now readying to each pre-empt and reply to Iranian missile assaults on their bases in addition to on US allies.
Iran’s Houthi insurgent proxy in Yemen might resume its marketing campaign of strikes in opposition to the US naval presence and industrial delivery in the Straits of Hormuz, as soon as again shutting down entry to the Suez Canal.
In Lebanon, Hezbollah seems to be refraining from becoming a member of the battle but stays a risk.
Should Iran’s tottering regime attain a level of collapse, it may properly determine to go for martyrdom in a blaze of glory — with strikes in opposition to Israel, Sunni Arab nations whom it regards as “Zionist collaborators,” in addition to American, Jewish and Israeli targets in Europe, North America and past.
Yet the US strikes may herald the transformation of a area that has been synonymous with foreign-policy and national-security failure since the occupation of Iraq more than 22 years in the past.
In 2003, FDD’s Mark Dubowitz believed that the Islamist regime in Tehran, fairly than the Iraqi Baathist one, was the true existential risk in the Middle East.
That rivalry has solely turn out to be stronger in the intervening years.
What’s important now is for the US to stay engaged — utilizing its political clout and unmatched navy capabilities to defend its pursuits in the Middle East, in partnership with a robust Israeli ally and maybe, at some point, with a free Iran.
Mark Dubowitz is chief govt of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, the place Ben Cohen is a senior analyst and director of FDD’s speedy response outreach.
