U.S. strikes on Iran nuclear sites only set program back months: report

The report from the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, according to sources, contradicts U.S. President Donald Trump who said the strikes 'obliterated' Iran's nuclear program.

A new U.S. intelligence report found that Iran’s nuclear program has been set back only a few months after a U.S. strike and was not “completely and fully obliterated” as U.S. President Donald Trump has said, according to multiple people familiar with the early assessment.

The intelligence report issued by the Defense Intelligence Agency on Monday contradicts statements from Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about the status of Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Two sources confirmed the contents of the report to the Associated Press, while Reuters said it had spoken to three people familiar. The people were not authorized to address the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

According to the people, the report found that while the Saturday strikes at the Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan nuclear sites did significant damage, they were not totally destroyed.

The assessment found that at least some of Iran’s highly enriched uranium was moved out of multiple sites before the U.S. strikes and survived, according to the people, and it also found that Iran’s centrifuges are largely intact.

At the deeply buried Fordo uranium enrichment plant, the entrance collapsed and infrastructure was damaged, so that will take time to fix, but the underground infrastructure was not destroyed, according to one of the people. The person also said that previous assessments had warned of this outcome at Fordo.

The White House strongly pushed back on the assessment, calling it “flat-out wrong.”

“The leaking of this alleged assessment 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,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement. “Everyone knows what happens when you drop fourteen 30,000 pound bombs perfectly on their targets: total obliteration.”