USA and Israel determined to wipe out Iran’s nuclear expertise

Over the past decades, Iran built an extensive knowledge ecosystem around its nuclear program – university departments, specialized machinery, and a robust system that included domestic uranium mining, processing, enrichment using advanced centrifuges, and storage in stockpiles. Experts say that even if Iran’s program is peaceful, Tehran has the architecture to weaponize it should it choose to. After Trump withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal struck by the Obama administration in 2015, Tehran began installing advanced centrifuges to accelerate its uranium enrichment. It succeeded in amassing more than 400 kilograms of highly enriched uranium, raising serious concerns among international agencies, which questioned why the Islamic Republic would need such a large quantity if its nuclear program was truly peaceful. The level of enrichment needed for nuclear power is under 4%, but Iran began enriching uranium as much as 60% after Trump pulled out of the nuclear deal in 2018.

Today, Iran is the only country in the world without nuclear weapons that is producing uranium enriched to 60 percent and it continues to use front companies and procurement agents to obscure its efforts to acquire dual-use items from foreign suppliers. Nuclear experts believe Iran had conducted diagnostic tests, nuclear effects modeling, and detonation simulations, all signs that Tehran was acquiring the knowledge needed to weaponize its program when desired. Even as Iran insisted that its nuclear program was entirely peaceful, Western nations have long suspected it of using front companies to circumvent international monitoring and develop dual-use technologies that could be rapidly repurposed to weaponize the program if the decision were made.

Last week, US President Donald Trump said the US was on track to achieve its objectives in the Iran war – including preventing Tehran from developing a nuclear weapon – and suggested the conflict could last two to three more weeks. But Iran still retains hundreds of kilograms of the core component needed to build a bomb, as well as decades of expertise. If the war stops, Iran could theoretically embark on a rapid effort for weaponization within one to two years. Therefore, before winding down the war, US and Israel are determined to wipe out Iran’s nuclear expertise.