Latest news with #MaxarTechnologies
Sky News AU
33 minutes ago
- Politics
- Sky News AU
‘We are coming for you': United States could issue dire threat to Iran as conflict escalates, according to retired US General
Former United States Army vice chief of staff General Jack Keane has claimed President Donald Trump could inflict total annihilation on Iran if the nation were to attack America. US strikes 'totally obliterated' three of Iran's key nuclear facilities on Sunday - Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz - according to President Trump, sparking fears of retaliation. However, General Keane told Sky News host James Macpherson on Monday he was 'absolutely confident' the US President had warned Iran any attack on its personnel or assets would have severe consequences. As a result, he argued there was a good chance Iran would not launch an attack as Ayatollah Ali Khamenei sought to preserve his regime. US strikes 'totally obliterated' three of Iran's key nuclear facilities on Sunday - Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz - according to President Trump, sparking fears of retaliation. Picture: Maxar Technologies 'I'm absolutely confident President Trump and his administration has told Khamenei, the Supreme Leader, the Ayatollah, that if you attack and harm us at all, we are coming for you,' General Keane said. 'And everything will be on the table. That is, you and your entire civilian leadership, all of your oil and gas operations, and anything that is of value, that has not been exterminated by what the Israelis have done for almost now approaching close to two weeks. 'That would be consequential to him (Ayatollah Khamenei), and it would likely put him in a position where there would be an internal change of of regime.' Commenting on the effectiveness of the US strikes, the retired General said he believed all three nuclear sites had 'likely' been destroyed, although assessments of the damage remain ongoing. Commenting on the effectiveness of the US strikes, the retired General said he believed all three nuclear sites had 'likely' been destroyed. Picture:'So, we believe the major complexes in the Fordow site have likely been destroyed and we believe also it may be likely inaccessible. Natanz, we think is gone, but we have to verify it, and Isfahan the same,' he said. 'So it'll take a few days, I think, to get a complete assessment made to see if there anything left, which would require the Israelis finishing it off.' General Keane explained a major intelligence effort, incorporating satellite imagery, aerial reconnaissance, monitoring Iranian communications, and in-person spy work, had underpinned the strikes. He also pushed back against warnings from some observers the US' strikes risked starting a new world war. 'The idea that some people think this is going to be World War III is just nonsense," he said. "I mean that is such shallow thinking, with no reasoning to see what the facts are here in front of us. We were ending a war, not starting a war."
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Politics
- Daily Mail
Opinion: Truth about Iran's nuclear arsenal we missed
On Sunday, US President Donald Trump claimed to have taken the bomb 'right out of Iran 's hands'. But this startling image suggests Iran may just have smuggled it out from under his nose. The satellite image – published by US defence contractor Maxar Technologies – shows 16 trucks leaving Iran's Fordow nuclear facility on June 19, three days before Operation Midnight Hammer: the American bombing campaign that struck three of Iran's largest nuclear facilities. If Shamkhani and other Iranian sources are to be believed, the trucks were loaded with 408kg of 60 per cent enriched uranium, not far from the 90 per cent purity required to be considered 'weapons grade'. Each truck could easily carry 80kg of uranium. In other words, 16 trucks is ample to remove all of Iran's enriched metal and still have room for other vital nuclear components including computer hardware and the enormous steel cylinders – built to withstand significant changes in temperature and pressure – in which uranium is stored and transported in powder form. If those trucks did remove Iran's stockpiles, then where is the uranium now, and – perhaps more importantly – what does Iran's increasingly desperate leader plan to do with it? The satellite that took this remarkable image would have been unable to follow the trucks. Either it would have had its camera fixed on the site, or – more likely – it would have been filming set co-ordinates related to its orbit around the earth. In other words, the moment the trucks pulled out of Fordow, the satellite lost visuals. Iran would have known that Israeli and US intelligence were aware of their activity so the trucks themselves would almost certainly have dispersed, making them more difficult to track, while also using diversion tactics such as doubling back and driving through areas with heavy traffic. It is unlikely the trucks will have gone to any of any of the mullahs' other known nuclear facilities. The Islamic Republic would have known that any impending US strike would have targeted multiple facilities, and, indeed, US B-2 stealth bombers and cruise missiles struck not only Fordow but the Natanz and Isfahan sites as well. But could Iran have further – hitherto unknown – nuclear facilities? It would not be alone if so. Pakistan and North Korea both covertly developed a nuclear bomb while apparently under tight US surveillance. The Islamic Republic has always claimed its nuclear programme is entirely for civilian purposes, notably renewable energy production. But it is entirely plausible that the theocratic regime has developed secretive laboratories with sophisticated centrifuges to quickly enrich uranium and develop it into a weapons-grade nuclear bomb. If this is true, then it could be just weeks before the Ayatollah launches a bomb aimed towards Israel – or even US and UK bases in the Middle East. This is, by far, the most alarming scenario. However, let's be clear, it is not the most likely. I would personally hedge that the smuggled uranium from Fordow has been dispersed across a number of pre-existing civilian industrial sites – such as telecoms facilities or some of Iran's enormous hydrocarbon plants – where it can be covertly stored without raising suspicion. No doubt, the regime will have elected sites within major cities. Although Israel has shown itself to be unmoved by civilian casualties, the US is unlikely to drop tomahawk bombs on a major city such as the sprawling capital of Tehran, home to more than 10million people. Thankfully, however, these pre-existing industrial sites – although effective for covert storage – are unsuitable for building a bomb. This is because the centrifuges required to enrich uranium are highly sensitive and would be extremely difficult to transport in working shape, certainly not to cities under aerial bombardment. While Iran may well have had up to 3,000 centrifuges across its three primary nuclear sites, they are likely to have been partially destroyed and buried deep beneath the rubble thrown up by US bunker-buster bombs. That, of course, is assuming that Israeli intelligence services are still struggling to track down the trucks. Mossad is often cited as one of the most sophisticated intelligence agencies in the world, targeting Iranian commanders with razor-sharp precision when it launched its first strike on the country earlier this month. Despite officials' silence, the hunt for the missing uranium may already be over. But that's not to say the threat is any weaker. When Saddam Hussein vowed to give up his WMD infrastructure in 1995, he did so fully aware that he had the institutional knowledge to resume his WMD programme in due course. Iran will likely be doing the same, safe in the knowledge that China and Russia will veto any UN attempts to initiate an inspectorate on the ground in Iran in the coming years. The major difference is that, unlike Saddam's Iraq, Iran knows America has no appetite for a land invasion. If the mullahs can weather the bombs being dropped from the sky, their nuclear dream remains within reach. With typical bravado, President Trump told reporters that Operation Midnight Hammer had been a 'spectacular success' and a historic display of US military might. 'Key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated,' he announced. This may well be the case. But enrichment facilities are only one part of the puzzle. Iran is a wounded beast but still possesses the scientific know-how and a greater motive than ever to build a bomb. The threat is not dead yet.
RNZ News
3 hours ago
- Politics
- RNZ News
Live: Israel strikes Teheran prison, access routes to Iran's Fordow nuclear site
This handout satellite image provided by Maxar Technologies shows the Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant in central Iran on 14 June 2025. Photo: AFP Israel has carried out fresh strikes against Iran including on the capital Tehran and the Iranian nuclear facility at Fordow, a target of the US attack at the weekend. Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz confirmed the notorious Evin prison had been targeted, alongside several other sites, including the flagship building of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard. Corps. Iran's air defense systems have been activated to intercept "hostile targets" in Ahvaz city, in the southwest region of the country, state-affiliated Fars News Agency reported today. - CNN / Reuters
Daily Mail
4 hours ago
- Politics
- Daily Mail
This satellite image reveals a terrifying truth about Iran's nuclear arsenal that we've all missed. Tehran could now be weeks away from the most shocking attack of all: MARK ALMOND
On Sunday, US President Donald Trump claimed to have taken the bomb 'right out of Iran 's hands'. But this startling image suggests Iran may just have smuggled it out from under his nose. The satellite image – published by US defence contractor Maxar Technologies – shows 16 trucks leaving Iran's Fordow nuclear facility on June 19, three days before Operation Midnight Hammer: the American bombing campaign that struck three of Iran's largest nuclear facilities.
NBC News
6 hours ago
- Politics
- NBC News
Trump said Iran's nuclear sites were 'obliterated' but questions remain about enriched uranium
But Jeffrey Lewis, an American expert in nuclear nonproliferation and a professor at the California-based James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, said on X that he was 'unimpressed' by both the U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran because they 'failed to target significant elements of Iran's nuclear materials and production infrastructure.' Iran's highly enriched uranium 'was largely stored in underground tunnels' near the Isfahan site, he said. But despite extensive American and Israeli attacks on the facility, he said, 'there does not seem to have been any effort to destroy these tunnels or the material that was in them.' He added that there had been 'no effort to strike the enormous underground facility next to Natanz where Iran can make more centrifuges and maybe do other things.' Satellite images taken two days before the strike on Fordo also showed 16 cargo trucks on an access road leading up to the complex. Released by Maxar Technologies, a U.S. defense contractor headquartered in Colorado, pictures taken the following day show the trucks had moved away from the site. Tehran is also signalling that its intent to achieve nuclear weapons is undimmed, maybe even strengthened. 'Even if the nuclear sites are destroyed, the game isn't over,' Ali Shamkhani, a top political, military and nuclear adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, wrote on X on Sunday. 'Enriched materials, indigenous knowledge, political will remain.' An assessment by FilterLabs, which uses artificial intelligence and experts to monitor social media, also suggests that Iranians believed that they would not have been attacked if the country had a nuclear weapon. 'What we have started to see in the last few days is actually Iranians say this is the reason why we should have a nuclear weapon,' FilterLabs founder and CEO Jonathan Teubner told NBC News on Monday. 'That if they had one, they would be more protected.' 'The fundamental reality remains that military action alone can only roll back the programme by degrees, not eliminate it fully,' Darya Dolzikova, a senior research fellow at the London-based Royal United Services Institute think tank, said in an op-ed Sunday. The success of the American attacks, particularly at the Fordo plant, 'is not immediately apparent,' she wrote. 'Imagery can't show much about the damage down at the centrifuge enrichment hall, so the U.S. and Israel will be relying heavily on intelligence from inside the Iranian system.' But even if the destruction was widespread, 'Iran retains extensive expertise that will allow it to eventually reconstitute what aspects of the programme have been damaged or destroyed,' she said. 'The Iranian nuclear programme is decades old and draws on extensive Iranian indigenous expertise. The physical elimination of the programme's infrastructure — and even the assassination of Iranian scientists — will not be sufficient to destroy the latent knowledge that exists in the country.'
