The US Bombing of Iran: Did it work?

ANALYSIS

US Defence Secretary Hegseth reiterating Trump’s claim that Iran’s nuclear capability had been ‘obliterated’. Preliminary intelligence suggests otherwise.

According to my reading of it, while the West is not engulfed in a full-scale war, significant damage has been done to the architecture of international conflict resolution and not very much, it seems, to the Iranian nuclear programme.

The Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu has been further empowered. For Gaza, where conditions are worsening by the day, this is bad news.

Summary

1. The core components of Iran’s nuclear programme are reported to have survived US bombing. This despite Trump’s assertion they had all been ‘obliterated’. The United Nations has been further emasculated. There is an increased trend towards one man taking complicated decisions in answer to complex problems rather than their being addressed by a political collective or body of experts. Iran’s nuclear programme will now likely go underground. Benjamin Netanyahu’s position is strengthened and he is stepping up his campaign in Gaza. For now there is no regional war. But has anything changed for the better?

Detail

2. According to multiple sources the US Defence Intelligence Agency – the intelligence wing of the Pentagon – has concluded that Donald Trump’s bombing of Iran has had limited impact on the country’s nuclear programme. According to the assessment, which is preliminary, the ‘core components’ of the programme are in tact and the strikes have probably only set back Iran’s progress towards a nuclear bomb by ‘months.’

3. Trump and his underlings have claimed that the Pentagon report is ‘wrong’ and was leaked to damage the president. They have, however, admitted that such a report exists. Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said in a statement: “This alleged ‘assessment’ is flat-out wrong…[It] 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. Everyone knows what happens when you drop fourteen 30,000 pound bombs perfectly on their targets: total obliteration.”

4. One of the results of the US bombing of Iran has been a further nail in the coffin of the United Nations, an organisation set up after World War II partly to adjudicate international conflict. Although American presidents have gone around the UN before (the war against Iraq in 2003 is an example) they have only done so after much hand-wringing and diplomatic negotiation. This time Trump behaved as if the UN didn’t exist at all.

5. Trump, arguably, contravened the US constitution and broke international law. The former insists that only congress can declare war. The second prohibits attacks on another country unless the aggressor faces an imminent threat of being attacked itself. The US bombing of Iran clearly does not meet this requirement.

6. The cumulative effects of these breaches are that we have moved further down a road where one man – be it the US president or another national leader – can attack a state with apparent impunity. Both bodies of experts – such as the UN, IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency), and other organisations – and national elected bodies - such as congress - are being sidelined. The result is a move in the direction of one-man rule in Washington that will only give the totalitarian leaders of the world – Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin and others – greater legitimacy.

7. In terms of the immediate effect on Iran, assuming the regime survives, it is only likely to drive its efforts to develop a nuclear bomb further underground. There is approximately 400 kgs of enriched uranium unaccounted for at the moment, and there may well be secret nuclear sites that the Israelis and Americans have failed to detect. If there is one lesson Iran, and other countries, will take away from the last week it is that only when you actually have a nuclear bomb are you safe from being attacked or overrun. The global nuclear arms race is likely to accelerate as a result.

8. Another likely effect is that the long-running battle in Iran between hardliners and moderates will tip in favour of the former. The moderates pushed hard for the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or Iran nuclear deal) and rapprochement with the West. Ayatollah Khamenei may have been reluctant but showed himself willing to give up on his race for a bomb in exchange for some sanctions relief. The Revolutionary Guard – the power elite in Iran – is now likely to push for less cooperation with the West and a renewed effort for nuclear weapons.

9. The last two weeks have both emboldened and strengthened Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli leader, whose poll numbers are once again on the up. This will make it even less likely that a solution can be reached to the Gaza war. According to the best estimates, since the Israel-Iran war began just under two weeks ago, 28 Israelis have died and around a thousand Iranians. In the same period the Israelis have killed an estimated 868 Gazan Palestinians, many of whom were queuing for food.

Conclusion

10. Despite the triumphalism from the White House it seems that the US bombing of Iran has not significantly set back the Iranian nuclear programme. It will probably just push it underground. Meanwhile it has weakened the international bodies that monitor and control nuclear proliferation and international conflict. It has empowered a leadership in Israel with an expansionist ethno-nationalist policy. While we have not (at least for now) seen the worst possible outcome - a full-on regional war and a global crisis – it has further normalised violence as a way to solve diplomatic disputes.