For the TACO files
President calls intelligence ‘inconclusive’ while defence secretary describes harm to facilities as ‘moderate to severe’
www.theguardian.com
Donald Trump and the US defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, have admitted to some doubt over the scale of the damage inflicted on Iran’s nuclear sites by
the US bombing at the weekend, after a leaked Pentagon assessment said
the Iranian programme had been set back by only a few months.
“The intelligence was very inconclusive,” Trump told journalists at a Nato summit in The Hague, introducing an element of uncertainty for the first time after several days of emphatic declarations that the destruction had been total. “The intelligence says we don’t know. It could’ve been very severe. That’s what the intelligence suggests.”
The president then appeared to revert to his claim that “it was very severe. There was obliteration”. Later in the day, he went to claim that was the conclusion from “collected intelligence”, and that the Iranian programme had been set back “decades”.
Trump also likened the US use of massive bunker-buster bombs on the Fordow and Natanz uranium enrichment sites to the impact of the US nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the second world war, using the comparison specifically in reference to their impact in ending a conflict.
Over the course of the day, Trump’s claims became more far-reaching, even rejecting reports from the nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), that Iran’s 400kg stock of 60% enriched uranium could no longer be accounted for, and appeared to have been moved. Earlier in the week, the vice president, JD Vance, had appeared to admit the US did not know where the highly enriched uranium was, said it would be a subject of discussions with the Iranians.
Trump claimed there would be a US-Iran meeting next week to negotiate once more about Tehran’s nuclear programme. “We’re going to talk to them next week with Iran, we may sign an agreement, I don’t know,” he said, before adding: “I don’t care if I have an agreement or not.”
Trump was also markedly less confident on Wednesday about
the ceasefire he had previous declared was “unlimited” and “going to go forever”, even suggesting that a return to conflict could be imminent.
“I dealt with both and they’re both tired, exhausted ... and can it start again? I guess someday, it can. It could maybe start soon,” he said.