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ABC News

14 minutes ago

• ABC News

Inside Iran's Fordow nuclear bunker experts say only US weapons can destroy

Deep below a mountain in Iran sits a once-secret uranium enrichment facility which now threatens to drag the United States into the Israel-Iran conflict. There is one bomb – a so-called "bunker-buster" – which may be able to reach and destroy the facility. But there is only one country in the world which could drop it. This is the Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant, located near the city of Qom. Aerial imagery shows the facility nestled in a mountain. It is accessed via tunnels, evidenced by entrances visible from the surface. The bulk of the nuclear facility is located under an estimated 90 metres of rock. At its heart is a large hall which houses centrifuges, used to enrich uranium to certain percentages. As if a mountain was not defence enough against air strikes – there are thought to be blast or debris traps near its entrances. A low percentage of enrichment – about 3 to 5 per cent – is required for the uranium to be used in civilian settings, like a nuclear power plant. A high level – generally about 90 per cent – is needed for use in modern atomic weapons. Fordow's location means conventional bombs, like those in Israel's possession, would have little to no effect on the parts of the facility buried deep. A secret base revealed In 2009, then-US president Barack Obama stood alongside the leaders of France and the UK, and revealed Iran had been building a "covert uranium enrichment facility near Qom for several years". He said a week earlier, Tehran had written to the UN's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), mentioning "a new enrichment facility, years after they had started its construction". IAEA inspectors were allowed into the facility in late 2009, where they were shown two halls, according to a 2019 report by the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS). The think-tank is led by David Albright, a leading American physicist and nuclear weapons expert, who is also a former weapons inspector. The report said one hall contained what one might expect for the enrichment of uranium for use in nuclear reactors, but the other hall was being stripped and modified at the time. "These observations contributed to several inspectors, including ones who were experts in gas centrifuges, becoming suspicious that this hall was for the onward enrichment of uranium up to weapon-grade," the report, authored by Mr Albright and two others, read. "Of course, Iran denied any such work," it said. Under the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), colloquially known as the Iran deal, Fordow was allowed to operate as a nuclear physics and technology centre, but was banned from uranium enrichment and storing nuclear material at the site for 15 years. 'The US and allied negotiators were not able to convince Iran to shut down this site, even though it has no credible civilian nuclear justification,' the ISIS report said. In 2018, during his first term, US President Donald Trump withdrew the US from the Iran deal, reportedly just days after a briefing from the Israeli prime minister on a daring raid in Tehran by Israel's foreign intelligence service, Mossad. A raid in the night The raid on Iran's "Atomic Archive", as it was labelled by Israel, has been extensively documented by the New York Times and Washington Post. The publications describe a clandestine night raid in early 2018 on a nondescript warehouse in Tehran by agents of Mossad. The agents torched their way into some of the 32 safes contained in the warehouse, after a two-year surveillance operation, stealing and smuggling out of the country tens of thousands of documents, and compact discs — containing memos, videos, and plans, relating to Iran's past nuclear research. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced the heist in April 2018 – presenting some of the documents in a televised address, arguing against the Iran deal. Later, select media outlets were given access to some of the haul by Israeli officials, who decided what they could and couldn't see. At the time, Iran said the documents were fraudulent. "Iran has always been clear that creating indiscriminate weapons of mass destruction is against what we stand for as a country and the notion that Iran would abandon any kind of sensitive information in some random warehouse in Tehran is laughably absurd," a statement from its UN mission in New York read. But among the haul, was a picture showing support facilities for the Fordow nuclear facility, then named the Al Ghadir project site. It also contained designs and diagrams for the underground portion of the project, according to the Institute for Science and International Security. The ABC's 3D map of the facility, featured above, is based on these blueprints — which are understood to be the only publicly available layouts of the facility. The IAEA says Iran stopped implementing all of the commitments it made as part of the Iran deal in February 2021 – including allowing daily access to Fordow, on request, for monitoring. The watchdog has still been able to verify what's happening at Fordow at less-regular intervals. Its latest report, released more than a week ago, said the facility is enriching uranium to 60 per cent — adding changes in its enrichment process had "significantly" increased the rate of production. "It's actually easier to go from an enrichment of 60 per cent to 90 per cent, than it is to get to that initial 60 per cent,' said nuclear physicist Kaitlin Cook in The Conversation. "It's a fairly trivial last step to go 90 per cent, which is why people were alarmed," said Jeffrey Lewis, an expert in nuclear non-proliferation from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies. "Fordow is not the largest enrichment facility, but it is the enrichment facility that we expected Iran to build as part of its nuclear weapons program. "If your goal is to eliminate the nuclear program, you have to eliminate Fordow," he said. Dan Shapiro, who was the US ambassador to Israel under Barack Obama until 2017, told ABC TV's 7.30, he believes Fordow needs to be destroyed. "If it survives and continues to be a facility where they can enrich at 60 per cent and when they choose, to sprint to 90 per cent, this campaign will not have achieved its objective," he said. "They [Iran] will remain capable and maybe even more motivated to produce a nuclear weapon at any time of their choosing." Iran has long denied having a nuclear weapons program. "Iran declared … quite a few times that … it does not have any nuclear, you know, just program in terms of military aspects," the Iranian Ambassador to Australia, Ahmad Sadeghi, told the ABC's David Speers, on Wednesday. The massive ordnance penetrator According to experts from the Royal United Services Institute, there is only one conventional weapon thought to be big enough to reach and destroy Fordow. The GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) is a behemoth. It weighs more than 13 tonnes, stands six metres tall, and is specifically designed to "defeat hard and deeply buried targets", like bunkers and tunnels, according to a fact sheet from a US Department of Defense agency. It is said to be able reach depths of up to 60 metres, before exploding. "Multiple GBU-57/B impacts would almost certainly be required to reach the Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant, with the second bomb impacting inside the hole made by the first," said Justin Bronk, an airpower specialist at RUSI. The United States is the only country known to have this kind of bomb – and the only one with the aircraft approved to deliver it, the B-2 Spirit Stealth Bomber. "While each B-2 can carry two GBU-57/Bs, such an attack would require redundancy since the weapons would have to function and be delivered perfectly to get down into the facility, and explode at the right depth to cause critical damage," Professor Bronk told ABC NEWS Verify. Another bombing aircraft, the B-52, has dropped the bombs during testing. B-2 bombers operate out of a US Air Force base in Missouri. But the uniquely shaped aircraft have, as recently as April, been seen at an air base on the island of Diego Garcia, in the Indian Ocean. That same month, US media reported the B-2s were being stationed there in a display of power to countries like Iran. Whether they take off from the US, or the Indian Ocean, the stealth bombers' range limitations mean they might need to refuel while in the air on any mission to Iran. According to Reuters, AirNav systems, a flight tracking website, said more than 31 US Air Force refuelling aircraft – primarily KC-135s and KC-46s – left the United States on Sunday. It said the flights had landed in Europe. The decision to bomb, or not, will ultimately be decided by the US commander in chief, Donald Trump. "I may do it. I may not do it," he said on Wednesday. The White House said on Friday that Trump would decide on whether to intervene in the conflict, or not, within two weeks. If a bombing raid is given the green light by the US president – there is no guarantee it will work. But in a 2024 podcast, David Albright said he believed Fordow was "more vulnerable" than people think. "We have the building designs, it's in the nuclear archive," he told Arms Control Poseur. "Israel has even more of those designs, they know exactly how the tunnels go, where they start, how they zig and zag, where the ventilation system is, the power supplies. "You don't have to bring down the roof of the enrichment hall to put that facility out of operation for a long time," he said. Notes about data used in this story:

ABC News

5 hours ago

• ABC News

Trump can keep control of National Guard in LA, appeals court rules

A US appeals court has let Donald Trump retain control on Thursday of California's National Guard while the state's Democratic governor proceeds with a lawsuit challenging the Republican president's use of the troops to quell protests in Los Angeles. Mr Trump's decision to send troops into Los Angeles prompted a national debate about the use of the military on US soil and inflamed political tension in the country's second most populous city. On Thursday (local time), a three-judge panel of the San Francisco-based 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals extended its pause on US District Judge Charles Breyer's June 12 ruling that Mr Trump had unlawfully called the National Guard into federal service. Mr Trump probably acted within his authority, the panel said, adding his administration probably complied with the requirement to coordinate with Governor Gavin Newsom, and even if it did not, he had no authority to veto Mr Trump's directive. "And although we hold that the president likely has authority to federalise the National Guard, nothing in our decision addresses the nature of the activities in which the federalised National Guard may engage," it wrote in its opinion. Mr Newsom could still challenge the use of the National Guard and US Marines under other laws, including the bar on using troops in domestic law enforcement, it added. The governor could raise those issues at a court hearing on Friday in front of Judge Breyer, it said. In a post on X after the decision, Mr Newsom vowed to pursue his challenge. "The president is not a king and is not above the law," he said. "We will press forward with our challenge to President Trump's authoritarian use of US military soldiers against our citizens." Mr Trump hailed the decision in a post on Truth Social. "This is a great decision for our country and we will continue to protect and defend law-abiding Americans," he said. "This is much bigger than Gavin, because all over the United States, if our cities, and our people, need protection, we are the ones to give it to them should state and local police be unable, for whatever reason, to get the job done." Judge Breyer's ruling was issued in a lawsuit against Mr Trump's action brought by Mr Newsom, where he ruled that Mr Trump violated a US law governing a president's ability to take control of a state's National Guard by failing to coordinate with the governor. It also found that the conditions set out under the statute to allow this move, such as a rebellion against federal authority, did not exist. Judge Breyer ordered Mr Trump to return control of California's National Guard to Mr Newsom. Hours after Judge Breyer acted, the 9th Circuit panel had put the judge's move on hold temporarily. Amid protests and turmoil in Los Angeles over Mr Trump's immigration raids, the president on June 7 took control of California's National Guard and deployed 4,000 troops against Mr Newsom's wishes. Mr Trump also ordered 700 US Marines to the city after sending in the National Guard. Judge Breyer has not yet ruled on the legality of the Marine Corps mobilisation. At a court hearing on Tuesday on whether to extend the pause on Judge Breyer's decision, members of the 9th Circuit panel questioned lawyers for California and the Trump administration on what role, if any, courts should have in reviewing Mr Trump's authority to deploy the troops. The law sets out three conditions by which a president can federalise state National Guard forces, including an invasion, a "rebellion or danger of a rebellion" against the government or a situation in which the US government is unable with regular forces to execute the country's laws. The appeals court said the final condition had probably been met because protesters hurled items at immigration authorities' vehicles, used a trash dumpster as battering rams, threw Molotov cocktails and vandalised property, frustrating law enforcement. The Justice Department has said once the president determines an emergency exists that warrants the use of the National Guard, no court or state governor can review that decision. The appeals court rejected that argument. The protests in Los Angeles ran for more than a week before they ebbed, leading Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass to lift a curfew she had imposed. In its June 9 lawsuit, California said Mr Trump's deployment of the National Guard and the Marines violated the state's sovereignty and US laws that forbid federal troops from participating in civilian law enforcement. The Trump administration has denied that troops are engaging in law enforcement, saying they are instead protecting federal buildings and personnel, including US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers. The 9th Circuit panel is comprised of two judges appointed by Mr Trump during his first term and one appointee of Democratic former President Joe Biden. Reuters

SBS Australia

7 hours ago

• SBS Australia

'Unmitigated disaster': What Donald Trump could be weighing up on Iran

US President Donald Trump says he's considering whether or not to involve the US in the Israel-Iran conflict. Source: AAP, Press Association / Suzanne Plunkett As hostilities between Israel and Iran continue, United States President Donald Trump is keeping the world guessing as to what he might do next. Israel launched a sweeping aerial campaign against Iran a week ago, calling it a "pre-emptive" strike to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons. Iran has denied plans to develop such weapons and retaliated by launching counterstrikes on Israel. Trump has repeatedly criticised Iran, called for an "unconditional surrender", and floated the possibility of US action in Iran. On Thursday, Trump said he has yet to decide how the US would proceed, but will do so in the next two weeks. He has indicated there is still a chance of negotiating with Iran. "Based on the fact that there's a substantial chance of negotiations that may or may not take place with Iran in the near future, I will make my decision whether or not to go within the next two weeks," press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters, quoting a message from Trump. Leavitt told a regular briefing at the White House that Trump was interested in pursuing a diplomatic solution with Iran, but his top priority was ensuring that Iran could not obtain a nuclear weapon. Professor Wesley Widmaier, from the Australian National University's Department of International Relations, said domestic policies could play a major role in Trump's decision. Widmaier said a portion of Trump's voter base may not support involvement in the conflict. "I think right now he is poised on the horns of a dilemma between the isolationist MAGA [Make America Great Again] coalition base and anti-Iran pro-Israel kind of foreign policy imperative," he said. "And politicians like to keep things ambiguous for as long as possible; it gives them maximum mobility." Widmaier said the two-week time frame will provide Trump with an extension to weigh up tensions in his supporter base, political strategy and pressure, and the US relationship with Israel. Michael Green, professor and CEO of the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney, said Trump is likely deciding whether or not to use a 13,000kg Massive Ordnance Penetrator 'bunker buster' bomb on an Iranian underground nuclear facility. Only the US military has the bunker buster bomb. "I believe that the decision he has to make is whether or not the US drops that bunker-busting bomb on Fordo, the remaining intact part of Iran's nuclear weapons programs," he said. "The reason he might do it is because the Israelis believe that the Iranians are weeks away from creating nuclear weapons capability. The reason to not do it is because there's no guarantee of success." Trump has not outlined exactly what US involvement in Iran could look like, but he has floated several possible scenarios. Comments and social media posts about his plans have veered from proposing a swift diplomatic solution to suggesting the US might join the fighting on Israel's side. On Wednesday, he said nobody knew what he would do. A day earlier, he mused on social media about killing Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, then demanded Iran's unconditional surrender. Iran has warned of "all-out war" if the US joins the military action. Green said while the Iranian regime is vulnerable, it could still "lash out" and cause threats to US forces and allied interests. He said Trump may be hoping the threat of the bunker buster bomb could influence Iranians to agree to peacefully give up their nuclear capability. "I am sceptical that Iran will, even under this huge amount of pressure, give up their nuclear program, [but] they might agree to meet, they might agree to talk about it, to dissipate the pressure," he said. "The most likely scenario is they put something out there to save themselves and it will be debated whether it's enough, and Donald Trump may or may not take it." Widmaier said he believes the US bombing Iran would be a "disaster". "My sense is this would all be leading to a disaster. It would just be a disaster for the region, it would be a disaster for American foreign policy," he said. If the Trump administration decides to pursue US action in Iran, Widmaier said it would need to have clear aims and a clear exit strategy. He said the US government would also want to be sure of public support if it were to take action. "These are lessons of the Vietnam war, these are lessons of the Iraq war, and I see no sense that they really know what they want," Widmaier said. Wars are easy to start, but hard to end. Wesley Windmaier "I say with a high level of confidence that it would be an unmitigated disaster, and it's something absolutely to be avoided. "I don't think you need a PhD to see that, given the disastrous military interventions that are a history of US foreign policy." While Trump has publicly criticised Iran and sided with Israel, US action against Iran is not guaranteed. In the next two weeks, Trump will weigh up different factors and scenarios, including opposition from some of his Republican colleagues, some of whom have said the US should avoid war. Kentucky senator Rand Paul said he hoped Trump would not give in to pressure to get involved. "It's not the US' job to be involved in this war," Paul said on NBC's Meet the Press on Sunday. Republican representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky said on X: "This is not our war. We should not engage our military here." Widmaier said it's possible the president could opt out of the US becoming directly involved in another Middle East conflict. He pointed out Trump does have a record of holding off in the context of Iran. "In his first term, he came right up to the brink of ordering some strikes against Iranian sites, and he backed off at the last possible minute," Widmaier said. "So he does seem to have some inhibitions against, it may be that at the last minute he pulls back ... he does have a pragmatic streak too." — Additional reporting by Reuters and the Australian Associated Press