The US Attack On Iran Shows A President Stuck In The 1960s

Last night, US President Donald Trump ordered an attack on three Iranian Nuclear sites: Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan. Distributed across the Iranian countryside, the attack on Fordow was reportedly carried out by the US stealth B-2 Bomber, using the overwhelming GBU-57 Massive Ordinance Penetration Bomb (MOAB) -considered the only weapon capable of penetrating deep underground to the Iranian nuclear site. It is presumed that the attacks on Natanz and Isfahan were carried out by US Attack Submarines using Cruz and other sea-launched missiles.

This attack fulfilled President Trump's promise to prevent Iran from obtaining Nuclear Weapons. On the White House.gov website is the article: "The President Has Always Been Clear: Iran Cannot Have A Nuclear Weapon."

That article listed more than 50 quotes from the President in various forums expressing the same sentiment. Included is the most recent and definitive:
"You can't have peace if Iran has a nuclear weapon." (6/14/2025)

https://www.whitehouse.gov/articles/2025/06/president-trump-has-always-been-clear-iran-cannot-have-a-nuclear-weapon/

While his sentiment was clear, it raises some interesting issues, of which the most interesting is whether Iran was trying to obtain nuclear weapons. According to the "Annual Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community," the answer is no: Iran was not trying to get the "Bomb."

"We continue to assess Iran is not building a nuclear weapon and that Khamenei has not reauthorized the nuclear weapons program he suspended in 2003, though pressure has probably built on him to do so."

https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/ATA-2025-Unclassified-Report.pdf


This is the document that Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard confirmed before the US Congress a couple of months ago and what brought the ire of the President. It is reported that Ms. Gabbard was excluded from many of the meetings in the Situation Room leading up to the American attack.

So why, then, do you suppose that the President has been so adamant in destroying what the Intelligence Community labeled a non-event?

The answer to that question will be readily apparent to those of a certain age but a total enigma to our younger fellows. During the entire period of the Cold War, which lasted for more than 40 years from the post-war years until the fall of the Soviet Union in 1992, the overwhelming threat was from a Soviet Nuclear Bomb.

School children, of which I was one, were instructed in what to do in the case of a nuclear attack. "Duck and cover" was the mantra; this meant we were to crawl under our desks to gain extra protection from flying objects. The success of this strategy is open to question. But its psychological impact was profound. Fear of the "bomb" was instilled in us all. A fear I believe that the President may still carry with him.

But that was then, and while the Nuclear Bomb remains the most threatening to overall life on the planet, after all, the radiation from such a bomb may have even more deleterious effects on life than the explosion itself. Today, other weapons possess an incredible ability to destroy.

Destructive capability combined with an unstoppable delivery system would present an existential threat to any country that faced it – and that's just the threat that Iran poses to Israel.

On November 21, 2024, Russia used just such a weapon to utterly destroy the industrial complex at PA Pivdenmash, Dnipro, Ukraine. Utilizing the Oreshnik missile, traveling at an estimated Mach 10 (10X the speed of sound), the missile had achieved such velocity that the "weapons" were reported to be tungsten "rods." Although not a "weapon" in the conventional sense, the impact of these inert "rods" was as profound as any explosive. Observers reported that the Oreshnik triggered explosions in the factory, which lasted for three hours and continued to burn for days.

But the real threat of the Oreshnik may be its ability to avoid opposition air defense. Of course, advanced air defense systems, such as the US Patriot system, which is incorporated in both the Israeli "Iron Dome" and Ukraine, are reported to intercept some Hypersonic missiles; nonetheless, many Hypersonics can strike their targets. And it is the number of hits that will ultimately determine the outcome of any battle.

From my perspective, the results suggest that a sufficient number of hypersonic missiles do avoid allied air defense and hit their targets, both Ukraine and Israel and that the opposition (Russia and Iran) have achieved a strategic advantage over Allied Forces (Ukraine and Israel).

Of course, none of the Allied Powers, Ukraine, Israel, or America would acknowledge such an advantage by the enemy. To do so would merely give a propaganda boost to forces we oppose. But that is the sad fact: both Russia and Iran have a strategic advantage over the US Allies Ukraine and Israel. While President Trump would be reluctant to admit so in public, it is entirely understandable. But to ignore this reality in his battle plans is suicidal, especially for those forces on the receiving end of those Hypersonic Missiles.

Yet that appears to be just what the President has done. By focusing exclusively on Iran's potential nuclear threat ("Iran cannot have a nuclear bomb) – a threat that our Intelligence Agencies assess is still months or years away. He has ignored the very real, very present specter of a weapon we cannot adequately defend. Trump has mixed the bug-a-boo of his past with the reality of today.

It may well be the strategic miscalculation of this struggle, tilting after a weapon-in-development, nuclear, while ignoring the weapon that is currently pounding Israel, the hypersonic missiles. Trump's focus on the past may cost Israel the war.