It’s understandable why Donald Trump felt a bit irritated by the media’s reaction to last weekend’s bombing raid on Iran. It truly was an impressive military operation.
Let me clarify—I fully acknowledge the necessity of scrutinizing that operation, and the US media has largely fulfilled its role: to investigate the official narrative and evaluate the expenditure of public funds. Make no mistake—this raid incurred billions.
Academics and think tanks also performed their duties, thoughtfully considering the implications of the action. Likewise, various intelligence agencies did what they are designed to do: objectively assess information unavailable to the public and report it to political leaders. At times, this information gets leaked for a variety of reasons.
So yes, we will conduct a bit of critical analysis ourselves later.
This situation is particularly notable, especially since the president campaigned on a platform of keeping the US out of foreign conflicts. Yet, the US found itself dragged into one—relatively quickly.
Many people in America pointed this out and questioned the effectiveness of the raid. This dissatisfied the president, who took it personally and his administration retaliated—going after specific journalists from several outlets, including CNN and Fox News.
During the NATO summit on Wednesday, he posted 28 times on social media expressing his grievances regarding the coverage. He accused the media of disrespecting the bomber crews and other military participants and downplayed the mission’s complexity (although the media coverage did neither, but hey).
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth went on the offensive for his boss, losing his composure at a heated press conference on Thursday and even calling out a former colleague at Fox News by name (the reporter in question is a respected 18-year veteran of the Pentagon beat).
So, how was the mission executed?
Back to the mission—the highlight of that press conference on Thursday was Air Force General Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who offered substantial background on the operation. This helps clarify the president’s indignation from the previous days.
General Caine disclosed that the bombing raid on Fordow was not just a spur-of-the-moment order from the Commander in Chief (let alone inspired by a Hollywood movie).
It was, in fact, a tremendously costly and complex operation that took fifteen years to develop.
He talked about the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), a lesser-known branch of the Pentagon based in Fort Belvoir, Virginia. Back in 2009, a DTRA officer was “brought into a vault at an undisclosed location and briefed on something happening in Iran,” according to General Caine’s account.
“He was shown some photos and highly classified intelligence on what appeared to be a significant construction project in the Iranian mountains. He was tasked with studying this facility and collaborating with the intelligence community to understand it, and soon he was joined by an additional teammate.”
These two individuals dedicated themselves to what is now known as the Fordow nuclear facility.
“For over 15 years, this officer and his teammate focused solely on the target: Fordow, a crucial element of Iran’s nuclear weapons efforts,” General Caine revealed.
“He observed the Iranians excavate it. He monitored the construction, the discarded materials, the geology, the construction materials, and their sources.
“He examined the ventilation shafts, the exhaust systems, the electrical setups, the environmental controls—every nook, every crater, every piece of equipment going in and out.”
Soon they realized the US lacked a weapon capable of destroying such a fortified facility.
Which is precisely why it was buried deep beneath a mountain.
Thus, the DTRA officers set about procuring a weapon that could fulfill that objective.
This initiative led the US to develop the “Bunker Busters,” the 13-ton bombs also known as the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP), or the more official designation, GBU-57.
General Caine noted that the MOP has been under development since 2004, but the Iran mission intensified focus and allocation of resources.
The president’s principal military advisor outlined the significant investment in technology: “At the onset of its development, we had so many PhDs working on the MOP program—engaging in modeling and simulation—that we quietly became the largest users of supercomputer hours in the United States.”
“They conducted extensive testing, exploring various options. They achieved hundreds of test shots and dropped numerous full-scale weapons on highly realistic targets for a singular purpose: to eliminate this target at the time and place of our nation’s choosing,” the General stated, showing video from one of those tests.
And that is the only video we’ve seen so far.
A skeptical public is asking why they haven’t yet witnessed video of the actual raid.
Undoubtedly, the Pentagon wishes to keep as many secrets as possible until they believe there’s little an enemy could gain from the footage’s release (and we’re still not seeing color imagery of previous bombings, as the military tends to censor details).
The B2 bombers completed a 37-hour round trip from an airbase in Missouri.
However, with pilots from following aircraft reporting explosions “as bright as daylight,” the public would surely like to see it too.
After all, they funded it. And judging by General Caine’s background information, it didn’t come cheap.
The estimated development cost of the MOP was around half a billion dollars, with an additional $400 million in production contracts.
No wonder the US is reported to possess only 20 or 30 of these bunker busters—now down to 14 after last weekend. So, America has used either half or two-thirds of its bunker buster stockpile in just one raid.
Then there’s the cost of the air operation. The B2 bombers undertook a 37-hour round trip from a central Missouri airbase.
The hourly operating cost of these planes is astonishing. For the B2, the Pentagon estimates about $65,000 per hour.
That amounts to approximately $2.4 million per bomber. With seven bombers involved, that totals around $16 million.
Overall, the raid involved 125 different aircraft, including refueling tankers (modified large passenger planes) and F-35 fighters, which cost $42,000 per hour to operate. (President Trump also stated that the F-22, America’s most advanced fighter, participated: this aircraft costs a reported $80,000 per hour to operate).
General Caine noted that analysts pinpointed two ventilation shafts at the Fordow site as potential vulnerabilities where the bunker busters could penetrate to the underground factory believed to house centrifuges for uranium enrichment.
This immediately sparked various movie-related memes, as folks recalled the plot of Star Wars. In fact, it was more akin to Top Gun Maverick: “miracle one and miracle two,” dislodging a concrete cover from the ventilation shafts and then deploying the munition down the shaft, set to detonate up to 100 meters underground.
However, unlike Top Gun, the bombers didn’t drop just one but five bunker busters down each of the two principal ventilation shafts. That’s five 13-ton bombs, released from 13 kilometers high, entering a tunnel mere meters wide. Just contemplate that.
For contrast, consider the World War II-era B-17 “Flying Fortress,” each of which carried about four tons of bombs, with only 20% dropping within 300 meters of their marked targets.
Thus, for technical ingenuity in aerial warfare, this mission was exceptional.
That said, the core criticism still stands: we lack concrete information regarding the mission’s effect on Iran’s nuclear program.
Even closed-door briefings for Senators and Congressmen on Thursday by General Caine and the CIA head left both us and them without clear answers.
Political party dynamics dominated the public discourse afterward: Democrat Senator Chris Murphy posited that the raid might have set back the Iranian program by merely three months, while Republican Senator Lindsey Graham argued it could delay the program for many years.
Only President Trump and his political allies are using the term “obliterated,” which is not typically employed by military or intelligence professionals to describe the effects of military ordnance.
What lies ahead for Iran?
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was correct in stating the only way to know for sure is to excavate Fordow. The Iranians might very well do so. If they discover that their structural defenses functioned as intended and safeguarded their presumed stockpile of uranium stored there, they could return to the nuclear agenda reasonably quickly—possibly to pursue a so-called “dirty bomb” that contaminates rather than destroys an enemy city.
The critical question for the Iranians is whether they wish to continue. Just as America has invested significantly to undermine the Iranian nuclear initiative, Iran has also poured a considerably larger fortune into establishing and maintaining that program.
Additionally, fortifying it within underground sites like Fordow demands colossal financial resources (there’s another site, labeled “Pickaxe Mountain” by Western intelligence, where another suspect underground facility was reportedly nearing operational status in recent weeks).
During his recent Middle East tour, President Trump took the opportunity to compare the struggles of ordinary Iranians with the seemingly more extravagant lifestyles of the Arab nations on the southern side of the Persian Gulf.
One oil-rich state spent its resources on nuclear weapons and funding proxy forces in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen, while others used their oil riches to erect dazzling towers, acquire football clubs, and attempt to transition their economies toward new technologies.
Mr. Trump proposed a similar uplift in living standards and aspirations for Iranians—but solely if they abandon their nuclear pursuits and cease undermining neighboring countries. He refrained from calling for regime change—no American officials have done so.
However, they must hope that ordinary Iranians, having seen forty years of investment and the Islamic Republic’s policies go up in smoke, will hesitate to restart with the same agenda.
Of course, the most perilous time for any oppressive regime is during its transition, which inevitably means loosening its grip on society. This may elucidate why Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is reluctant to enter negotiations with the Americans about future developments.
President Trump wishes to commence discussions next month, presumably picking up where his envoy Steve Witkoff left off. Unfortunately, it likely won’t be as straightforward as he hopes.
Amir Asmar, a former Middle East analyst for the US Department of Defense and now a scholar at the foreign policy think tank The Atlantic Council, outlined three scenarios for the Iranians, contingent on how much of their program survived the Fordow raid.
In the first scenario, if the Fordow facility and its centrifuge cascade—the machines responsible for enriching uranium to weapons-grade—are impaired and inoperable, Tehran may be compelled to accept negotiated limitations on its nuclear program.
However, if much of the machinery escapes unscathed, Asmar believes that “nothing short of endangering the regime itself would lead Tehran’s current leaders to permanently relinquish decades of commitment to an indigenous nuclear program.”
Thus, he concludes that a partially damaged Fordow will likely only induce a temporary pause—in both Iran’s nuclear efforts and in Israel’s attempts to neutralize them.
Further attacks would likely occur, with or without US involvement.
In the second scenario, Asmar envisions total annihilation of Fordow, with none of its highly enriched uranium stock surviving.
Here, he argues that Iranian leaders would determine that holding out in nuclear discussions offers no advantage since it would take years (and tens of billions in oil revenues) to rebuild the program, along with the ballistic weapons program that has also sustained severe damage.
Moreover, as the world watches, any efforts to restart these programs would be easily detectable and might lead to Israeli strikes at the very least.
He suggests that compliance would necessitate even stricter monitoring from the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency.
Iran is considering withdrawing from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
The agency’s head, Rafael Grossi, mentioned that the centrifuge machines at Fordow and elsewhere are “extremely vibration-sensitive,” and given the extensive explosive effects unleashed by the B2 raid, “very significant damage is expected to have occurred.”
However, Iran’s parliament has already initiated measures to terminate Iran’s membership in the IAEA and obfuscate the inspections that accompany it. Iran is also deliberating a withdrawal from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which obliges signatories to refrain from acquiring nuclear weapons in exchange for access to nuclear technology for energy and peaceful purposes.
Though Iran’s extensive nuclear facility development, extending beyond peaceful objectives, suggests non-compliance with the NPT (enriching uranium to 60% is far beyond what a nuclear energy program requires), the treaty has practical applications.
It supplied the necessary legal justification for the UN Security Council’s sanctions on Iran.
Without the NPT, Iran’s only legal barrier against developing a nuclear weapon would be Ayatollah Khamenei’s fatwa against it. Iran could effortlessly exit the NPT and cultivate a bomb without scrutiny from the IAEA.
Writing in The Atlantic magazine, Thomas Wright, who served as senior director of strategic planning at the National Security Council during the Biden Administration, argued this presents a significant issue regarding the President’s assertion that the Iranian nuclear initiative has been “obliterated.”
“Trump could have mitigated this risk by informing the public that while the strikes appeared successful, accurately determining their results would take time.
“He could then have insisted on a week-long ceasefire aimed at reaching a diplomatic agreement with Iran—one that would impose restrictions on Iran’s nuclear operations and ensure continued access for the IAEA, whose inspectors remain in Iran but have not been allowed into nuclear sites.
“Given the probable damage inflicted on the program, he could have afforded to stop short of demanding total dismantlement and instead settled for strict limits on enrichment, alongside round-the-clock inspections with no expiration date.
“However, Trump opted for a diverging path by claiming the problem was entirely resolved and not leveraging this moment to secure commitments from Tehran. Tensions between Washington and Jerusalem seem almost inevitable following this decision,” he wrote.
The peril of a half-completed job—or worse, inflicting minimal damage—is that Iran’s Supreme Leader might decide to escalate quickly, accelerating the development of an A-bomb and exploding one to demonstrate to adversaries that Iran belongs in the nuclear club and to deter future aggressors.
The long-term outlook for regional security and stability would suffer immensely.
From Gaza to Yemen, Kurdistan to Afghanistan, the prospects for achieving peace in this deeply troubled region would diminish even further. This stands in stark contrast to the aims of the attacks.
No wonder the efficacy of the raid has become such a sensitive issue for the President. There may be a ceasefire—but what comes next?
