‘Either there will be peace, or there will be a much greater tragedy for Iran,’ threatens Donald Trump

9:17

In a speech, the President of the United States announces the ‘total destruction’ of the Iranian nuclear facilities in Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan.

Donald Trump claimed to have achieved a “spectacular military success” after destroying three facilities in Iran . We will see if that is true. What is clear is that he has pushed the United States into a war with Iran that, by his own admission, could escalate.

Beyond the questions about whether there is a legal basis for bombing Iran, I see risks for the United States and the world around three fundamental unknowns.

The Iranian response

Another option would be to try to close the Strait of Hormuz, either partially or completely, by attacking ships or laying mines. This could be a blow to the global economy, since a quarter of the world’s oil passes through it. Experts told me they believe the United States could eventually reopen the strait, but that could come with economic and other costs. When Iran mined the strait in 1988, a mine severely damaged the U.S. Navy torpedo boat Samuel B. Roberts.

When the United States assassinated Qassem Suleimani, a top Iranian general, in 2020, Iran launched a barrage of missiles at U.S. bases in Iraq. A Ukrainian passenger plane was accidentally hit, killing all 176 people on board.

My guess is that Iran may want to retaliate more forcefully this time, in part to try to reestablish its deterrence capability, but its ability to do so may be more limited.

Israeli strikes could have crippled its ability to mine the strait, for example, and it would also have impeded Iranian oil shipments to China, angering its friends in Beijing.

But it’s worth remembering something that James Mattis, Trump’s first-term defense secretary, once said: “No war is over until the enemy says it is. We may think it is over, but in fact the enemy has a voice.”

The future of the nuclear program

The second uncertainty is whether the Israeli and American strikes have ended Iran’s nuclear efforts or perhaps even accelerated them. That depends in part on whether the bombing of Fordow and other sites was as successful as Trump claimed, and that may take time to figure out.

It was not clear beforehand whether even the American megabombs would be enough to destroy the Fordow enrichment site, which is buried deep in a rocky mountainside. Nor is it known whether Iran has other centrifuges in another unknown location.

There is broad agreement that a nuclear-armed Iran would be a disaster and would prompt other countries in the region to develop their own weapons programs. But Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s director of national intelligence, said publicly this spring that Iran was not building a nuclear weapon; she ruled out that possibility.

The risk is that Israeli and American strikes will lead the Iranians to decide they need nuclear weapons. After all, if Iran had nuclear weapons, Israel would have been much less likely to bomb it.

Iran has enriched enough fissile material for up to 10 nuclear weapons, according to experts; the material is believed to be in the city of Isfahan. Trump said the US had attacked Isfahan, but it was unclear whether the site was destroyed.

What lies ahead?

The third and final question is the most important: is this the end of the conflict or the beginning?

Optimists like Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel seem to believe that he and the United States can bring an end to Iran’s nuclear program and the Iranian regime. On the other hand, Netanyahu was a strong supporter of the Iraq war and thought it would bring change to Iran as well; instead, the Iraq war benefited Iran.

Even if Iran’s enrichment capacity is gone, it probably won’t be possible to eliminate the technical know-how to enrich uranium. So if the regime remains in power, it could be more of a setback than an end to the nuclear program.

As for the idea that the bombings will destroy the regime, there is little sign of that. Iranian dissidents, such as Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi, condemned the bombings last week and called on Trump to stop them rather than join them.

In my travels to Iran, I have seen how unpopular the regime is. Iran has always seemed to me — on a popular level — to be one of the most pro-American countries in the region, precisely because the government is so hated for its corruption, hypocrisy and economic incompetence.

This pro-Americanism seemed to bode well for the future, following the death of the supreme leader. But a pro-American government seems less likely if we go to war with Iran. In fact, regime change might look more like a hard-line coup than anything else. Again, the range of possibilities is immense, with some quite alarming.

Senator Chris Van Hollen, Democrat of Maryland, described the risks this way: “While we all agree that Iran should not have nuclear weapons, Trump has abandoned diplomatic efforts to achieve that goal and has instead chosen to needlessly endanger American lives, further threaten our military in the region, and risk embroiling the United States in another long-running conflict in the Middle East. The U.S. intelligence community has repeatedly assessed that Iran is not developing nuclear weapons. There was more time for diplomacy to work.”