US-Israeli Strikes on Iran's Nuclear Sites Could Backfire, Experts Warn
A satellite image from 2020 shows the Natanz uranium enrichment facilities, located approximately 300 kilometres south of Tehran. In June 2025, the United States and Israel launched coordinated military strikes targeting this site and other critical nuclear infrastructure in Iran. Photograph credit goes to Maxar Technologies Handout and the Environmental Protection Agency.
Analysis: Attempt to Destroy Iran's Nuclear Programme May Backfire
Proliferation experts have issued a stark warning that the US-Israeli onslaught against Iran, intended to resolve a 24-year standoff over Tehran's nuclear ambitions, could dangerously backfire. Instead of neutralising the threat, the attacks might drive the regime towards secretly developing a nuclear bomb or embolden other groups to steal Iran's uranium stockpile.
The regime in Tehran has consistently maintained that its nuclear programme is solely for civilian purposes, with no intention of weaponising it. However, since the discovery of two undeclared sites in 2002—one for uranium enrichment and another for heavy water plutonium production—the international community has viewed Iran's activities with intense suspicion and deep concern.
A landmark nuclear deal in 2015 imposed severe limits and thorough inspections on Iran's nuclear facilities. This agreement collapsed in 2018 when former US President Donald Trump withdrew from it, prompting Iran to ramp up its enrichment work and other aspects of the programme significantly.
Critical Uranium Stockpile and International Anxiety
Most alarmingly for global security, Iran had produced a stockpile of just over 440 kilograms of highly enriched uranium (HEU) with 60% purity by the summer of the previous year. Technically, once uranium reaches 60% enrichment, it is a relatively straightforward step to achieve 90% purity—the weapons-grade level required for compact warheads.
With further enrichment and conversion from gas to metal form, Iran's 440-kilogram stockpile would be sufficient to manufacture more than ten nuclear warheads. This accumulation of HEU, which occurred after the collapse of the 2015 nuclear deal, was the primary motive behind the US-Israeli strikes in June 2025.
The US operation, codenamed Operation Midnight Hammer, focused on deploying bunker-busting bombs to target Iran's nuclear sites. Trump claimed the bombardment had "obliterated" Iran's nuclear programme, but it soon became evident that this assertion was false. While the bombs caused extensive damage, deep underground facilities burrowed beneath mountains at sites like Isfahan and Natanz remained largely intact and operational.
Loss of Oversight and Escalating Risks
In response to the attacks, Iran excluded United Nations inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) from these and other sensitive sites. Consequently, the watchdog lost track of the 440-kilogram HEU stockpile and could no longer monitor activities in the deep tunnels at Isfahan and Natanz.
In its latest report, the IAEA conceded it could not verify whether Iran had suspended all enrichment-related activities or determine the exact size of its uranium stockpile at the affected nuclear facilities. Despite this uncertainty, IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi stated on Monday that "we don't see a structured programme to manufacture nuclear weapons."
However, nuclear proliferation experts worry this assessment might change following an attack aimed at destroying the regime that has ruled Iran for 47 years, including the killing of its supreme leader, Ali Khamenei. Khamenei had previously issued a religious edict, or fatwa, against building a nuclear bomb.
Expert Warnings and Global Implications
Jeffrey Lewis, a distinguished scholar of global security at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, emphasised the high stakes. "That is what makes this such a tremendous roll of the dice," he said. "Because if the strike does not succeed in removing a regime, there remain thousands of people in Iran who are capable of reconstituting a programme like this."
Lewis added, "The technology itself is decades old, and a vengeful Iran that survives this strike is likely to reach the same conclusion that North Korea reached, that it's a dangerous world out there with the United States, and it's better to go nuclear."
Kelsey Davenport, the director for nonproliferation policy at the Arms Control Association, agreed that the aftermath of the attack could create greater motivation within the remnants of the regime. She noted this could push Iran towards weaponisation "no matter how this conflict ends, because of the nature in which it started."
Davenport pointed out that if the regime collapsed or if a civil war erupted, the fate of Iran's HEU stockpile would become a major global crisis. "If we end up in a scenario where we have regime implosion, where Iran becomes so internally destabilised that there is a real risk that material is diverted, that it is stolen ... there's going to be a lot of pressure on the United States to put boots on the ground," she warned.
She further highlighted, "There's a real nuclear terrorism risk to Trump's regime change objective that I have not heard the administration acknowledging."
