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U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday claimed that recent strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities had set the country’s atomic ambitions back by decades, describing the operation as “total obliteration,” despite conflicting assessments from U.S. intelligence agencies suggesting more modest damage.
Speaking ahead of a NATO summit in The Hague, Trump praised what he described as a devastating blow delivered by U.S. forces in coordination with Israeli intelligence. “This was a devastating attack,” Trump told reporters. “Israel is doing a report on it now, I understand, and I was told that they said that it was total obliteration.”
Trump suggested that Israeli agents had inspected the damage on the ground. “You know they have guys that go in there, after the hit, and they say it was total obliteration,” he added.
The president also linked the airstrikes to the ongoing hostage crisis in Gaza, where more than 50 captives, including several Americans, are still believed to be held by Hamas. “It will help get the hostages back, absolutely,” Trump said. “This puts pressure on Iran like never before.”
However, a preliminary intelligence report from the Pentagon paints a more restrained picture. According to sources familiar with the assessment, the strikes temporarily disrupted Iranian nuclear infrastructure but failed to eliminate the country’s stockpile of enriched uranium or permanently dismantle its capability to rebuild. The report estimates that the program has been delayed by a few months, not decades.
When pressed about the discrepancy between his statement and the intelligence community’s findings, Trump dismissed the conclusions. “They really don’t know,” he said. “The intelligence was very inconclusive. The intelligence says we don’t know. It could’ve been very severe. That’s what the intelligence suggests.”
Still, he doubled down on his original claim. “It was very severe. There was obliteration,” he insisted, contradicting the cautious tone of his own defense officials.
Tensions in the Gulf had reached a boiling point last week after Iran launched a retaliatory missile strike on the U.S. airbase at Al Udeid in Qatar, following coordinated American and Israeli attacks on suspected Iranian nuclear sites. The brief escalation ended with a ceasefire brokered through backchannel diplomacy involving Gulf states and the European Union.
Trump told reporters that the ceasefire “is going well” and reiterated his commitment to “peace through strength.”
As world leaders convene in The Hague to discuss NATO’s role in addressing regional threats, Trump’s remarks are likely to further strain consensus on how to deal with Iran’s nuclear ambitions. European allies, particularly France and Germany, have expressed concern over the potential long-term fallout of the strikes and the lack of a clear diplomatic path forward.
Iran has yet to release an official report on the extent of the damage, but Iranian state media has downplayed the impact, calling the sites “minor” and vowing to continue its nuclear development.
Meanwhile, hostage negotiations in Gaza remain ongoing, with international mediators hoping that the fragile ceasefire will create the space needed for a potential breakthrough.