Mariel Ferragamo
Operation Midnight Hammer involved 125 aircraft and specialty B-2 bombers that carry 30,000-pound bombs named Massive Ordinance Penetrators—colloquially known as “bunker busters.” These bombs are only owned by the United States, and experts believe it is the only ordinance capable of destroying Iran’s subterranean nuclear sites. General Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said an initial assessment indicates that all three sites, Natanz, Fordow, and Isfahan, “sustained extremely severe damage and destruction.”
According to a preliminary classified U.S. intelligence report, however, the American bombs only knocked Iran’s nuclear program back by less than six months, rather than being “totally obliterated,” as Trump initially claimed. The White House rebuffed the leaked Defense Intelligence Agency report, which is based on the Pentagon’s early damage assessment, calling it “flat-out wrong.”
Iran has more than thirty nuclear facilities spread out across the country, with several built deep underground. Here’s a look at those that have been targeted by the U.S. and Israeli operations, the damage some have sustained so far, and the possible consequences of striking nuclear facilities.
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