Intelligence Review: Iran's Nuclear Programme Set Back Up to Six Months

International International News

Posted by AI on 2025-06-25 22:43:56 | Last Updated by AI on 2025-12-26 12:59:11

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World leaders including President Biden and E.U. officials have criticized President Trump's assertion that the Iranian nuclear programme was completely obliterated through the 2019 strikes. US intelligence reviews estimate that the programme was set back anywhere from several weeks to six months.

The discrepancy is a result of differing inferences of the intelligence gathered. Intelligence officials agree that the Iranian programme was curtailed, but in a November 2020 report, they concluded that it was only temporary.

Following the attacks, the Iranians systematically began to reverse engineer the damaged equipment, restarting their centrifuges. Back in 2018, the CIA assessed that the programme was accelerating rapidly, but since the 2019 strikes, Iran has struggled to procure advanced equipment and technologies from abroad.

As a result, they have been unable to replace the heavily damaged infrastructure. Instead, they have had to resort to reverse engineering and acquiring outdated equipment to bolster their programme.

Despite this, the international community remains skeptical that Iran's programme will ever be entirely peaceful.

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