Preliminary intelligence assessments of the U.S. airstrikes on Iranian nuclear sites suggest the bombing did not destroy the facilities, contradicting claims by President Donald Trump and other administration officials. The assessments reportedly determined that attacks by the United States and Israel may have delayed Iran’s ability to produce a nuclear weapon by only a few months.
The classified assessments were reported Tuesday, June 24, by The New York Times and CNN. The White House rejected the assessment’s conclusions.
Facilities not destroyed
Trump has said that American-made bunker-buster bombs “completely and totally obliterated” the three Iranian facilities targeted on Saturday, June 21. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth repeated that assertion during a news conference Sunday, June 22.
But the Times and CNN said the report by the Defense Intelligence Agency came to a very different conclusion. Both news outlets cited officials familiar with the agency’s assessment.
The bombing sealed off entrances to two Iranian sites, the Times reported, but did not destroy or collapse underground buildings where scientists were believed to be enriching uranium. The strikes reportedly damaged the electrical system at the Fordo nuclear site, which was constructed deep inside a mountain. It is not clear how long it would take Iran to repair damage and restart Fordo and other facilities if it chooses to do so. Regardless, the bombs apparently did not penetrate underground structures at Fordo, Natanz or Isfahan.
The Defense Intelligence Agency also found that Iran retained control of almost all of its nuclear material. The agency found that much of Iran’s enriched uranium had been moved to other locations before the U.S. airstrikes. CNN quoted an official who said uranium centrifuges were mostly “intact.”
Short-term setback
The intelligence agency said the U.S. bombs and airstrikes by Israel may have delayed Iran’s nuclear program by no more than six months. Before last weekend’s attack, the Times reported, U.S. intelligence officials believed Iran had the capacity of rushing a bomb to completion within three months.
Both the Times and CNN quoted officials who stressed that the assessment is preliminary.
But Rep. Michael McCaul, a Republican from Texas who sits on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told CNN: “I’ve been briefed on this plan in the past, and it was never meant to completely destroy the nuclear facilities, but rather to cause significant damage. But it was always known to be a temporary setback.”
CNN also quoted Jeffrey Lewis, a professor at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, who said the U.S. attack failed to cripple Iran’s nuclear program. Lewis has studied commercial satellite images of the sites hit by U.S. bombs.
He said the ceasefire between Iran and Israel announced by Trump “came without either Israel or the United States being able to destroy several key underground nuclear facilities.”
Those facilities, he said, “could serve as the basis for the rapid reconstitution of Iran’s nuclear program.”
White House response
In a statement to the Times, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt called the Defense Intelligence Agency’s assessment “flat-out wrong,” but she pointed to no specific inaccuracies.
“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,” Leavitt’s statement said. “Everyone knows what happens when you drop 14 30,000-pound bombs perfectly on their targets: total obliteration.”
