Dubai, Jun 22 (AP) The United States inserted itself into Israel's war against Iran by dropping 30,000-pound bombs on a uranium enrichment site early Sunday, raising urgent questions about what remains of Tehran's nuclear programme and how its weakened military might respond.
Iran lashed out at the US for crossing “a very big red line” with its risky gambit to launch strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites with missiles and the bunker-buster bombs.
“The warmongering and lawless administration in Washington is solely and fully responsible for the dangerous consequences and far-reaching implications of its act of aggression,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said, adding that he would immediately fly to Moscow to coordinate positions with close ally Russia.
Amid fears of a wider regional conflict, the Trump administration sent a clear message that it wanted to restart diplomatic talks with Iran. Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters that the US “does not seek war” with Iran. But Tehran said the time for diplomacy had passed and that it had the right to defend itself.
President Donald Trump earlier warned there would be additional strikes if Tehran retaliated against US forces. “There will either be peace or there will be tragedy for Iran,” said Trump, who acted without congressional authorisation.
The Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran confirmed that attacks took place on the Fordo and Natanz enrichment facilities as well as the Isfahan nuclear site. Both Iran and the UN nuclear watchdog said there were no immediate signs of radioactive contamination around the sites.
Trump claimed the US “completely and fully obliterated” the sites, but the Pentagon reported “sustained, extremely severe damage and destruction.” US defence officials said an assessment was ongoing.
With the attack, the United States has inserted itself into a war it spent decades trying to avoid. Success could mean ending Iran's nuclear ambitions and eliminating the last significant state threat to the security of Israel, its close ally. Failure — or overreach — could plunge the US into another long and unpredictable conflict in the Middle East.
For Iran's supreme leader, it could mark the end of an ambitious campaign to transform the Islamic Republic into a greater regional power that holds enriched nuclear material a step away from weapons-grade. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last spoke publicly on Wednesday, warning the US that strikes targeting the Islamic Republic will “result in irreparable damage for them.”
Iran, battered by Israel's largest-ever assault on it that began on June 13, has a few ways it could retaliate. It could launch a wave of attacks on US forces stationed in the Middle East with the missiles and rockets that Israel hasn't destroyed. It could attempt to close a key bottleneck for global oil supplies, the Strait of Hormuz between it and the United Arab Emirates.
Or it could hurry to develop a nuclear weapon with what remains of its program. The Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran insisted that its nuclear program will not be stopped.
New questions about Iran's nuclear stockpile
Iran has long maintained that its nuclear programme was peaceful, and US intelligence agencies have assessed that Tehran is not actively pursuing a bomb. However, Trump and Israeli leaders have argued that Iran could quickly assemble a nuclear weapon.
Israel has significantly degraded Iran's air defences and offensive missile capabilities and damaged its nuclear enrichment facilities. But only the US military has the bunker-buster bombs that officials believe offered the best chance of destroying sites deep underground and the planes to drop them.
Fourteen of the bombs were used on two nuclear sites, including Fordo, according to Air Force Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In all he said, 75 precision-guided weapons were used, including missiles fired from a submarine.
The strike on Fordo, which is dug deep into a mountain, raised an urgent question — what has happened to Iran's stockpile of uranium and centrifuges?
Satellite images taken by Planet Labs PBC after the American strikes, analysed by The Associated Press, show damage to the facility.
The images suggest Iran packed the entrance tunnels to Fordo with dirt and had trucks at the facility ahead of the US strikes. Several Iranian officials, including Atomic Energy Organization of Iran spokesman Behrouz Kamalvandi, have claimed Iran removed nuclear material from targeted sites.
Before the Israeli military campaign began, Iran said it had declared a third, unknown site as a new enrichment facility.
“Questions remain as to where Iran may be storing its already enriched stocks … as these will have almost certainly been moved to hardened and undisclosed locations, out of the way of potential Israeli or US strikes,” said Darya Dolzikova, a senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute focused on nonproliferation issues.
“It is also unclear what secret facilities may exist inside Iran that Tehran could use for continued centrifuge production enrichment and weapons-relevant activities.”
The International Atomic Energy Agency did not respond to a request for comment over Iran possibly moving nuclear material. The head of U.N.'s nuclear watchdog said he will convene an emergency meeting of the Board of Governors on Monday.
Global leaders responded with shock and calls for restraint. The United Nations Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting Sunday. Egypt warned of “grave repercussions” for the region. Bahrain, home to the US Navy's Middle East-based Fifth Fleet, called on Iran and the US to “quickly resume talks.”
Trump's risky gambit
The decision to attack was a risky one for Trump, who won the White House partially on the promise of keeping America out of costly foreign conflicts.
But Trump also vowed that he would not allow Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon, and he had initially hoped that the threat of force would bring the country's leaders to give up its nuclear programme.
For Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the strikes were the culmination of a decades-long campaign to get the US to strike Israel's chief regional rival and its disputed nuclear program.
Netanyahu praised Trump, saying that “your bold decision to target Iran's nuclear facilities, with the awesome and righteous might of the United States, will change history.” The Israeli military said Saturday it was preparing for the possibility of a lengthy war.
Iran and Israel trade more attacks
Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard said it launched a barrage of 40 missiles at Israel, including its Khorramshahr-4, which can carry multiple warheads. Israeli authorities reported that more than 80 people suffered mostly minor injuries, though one multistory building in Tel Aviv was significantly damaged.
Israel's military said it “swiftly neutralised” the Iranian missile launchers that had fired, and that it began a series of strikes toward military targets in western Iran.
Explosions boomed Sunday afternoon in the Iranian port city of Bushehr, home to Iran's only nuclear power plant, three semiofficial Iranian media outlets reported.
Israel's military said it struck missile launchers in Bushehr, Isfahan and Ahvaz, as well as a missile command centre in the Yazd area where it said Khorramshahr missiles were stored.
Israeli strikes on Iran have killed at least 865 people and wounded 3,396 others, according to the Washington-based group Human Rights Activists. The group said of those dead, it identified 363 civilians and 215 security force personnel.
At Turkiye's border with Iran, one departing Iranian defended his country's nuclear program.
“We were minding our own business,” Behnam Puran said.
At least 24 people in Israel have been killed and over 1,000 wounded. (AP)
GRS
GRS