Of B-2s and Bunker Busters

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The mission—dubbed Operation Midnight Hammer—required multiple in-flight refuelings and hundreds of planes, including fighter jets, refueling tankers, and reconnaissance aircraft. It also utilized an offshore submarine, which fired more than two dozen Tomahawk missiles against above-ground targets at the nuclear site in Isfahan. But the most important job was left to the B-2s. In addition to striking Natanz, the stealth bombers dropped GBU-57 “Massive Ordnance Penetrators” on Fordow, an Iranian uranium enrichment plant built into the side of a mountain. The aerial attack marked the largest operational strike using B-2s to date and the second-longest B-2 mission ever flown.

Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters Sunday that the U.S. pilots made it into and out of Iran without coming under fire from either enemy fighters or anti-aircraft systems. And initial assessments indicated that all three sites sustained “extremely severe damage and destruction,” he added. According to Fox News, the precision strike on Fordow targeted ventilation shafts, allowing the munitions to penetrate more deeply. But it will likely take time before the full extent of the damage is understood. “It would be way too early for me to comment on what may or may not still be there,” Caine said when asked if some nuclear capability in Iran remains.

Unlike Israel’s ongoing campaign in Iran, the American operation targeted the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program alone. “President Trump has consistently stated, for over 10 years, that Iran must not get a nuclear weapon—full stop,” Hegseth said from the Pentagon on Sunday. “We devastated the Iranian nuclear program. But it’s worth noting, the operation did not target Iranian troops or the Iranian people.” Asked by a reporter whether Washington was seeking regime change in Iran, Hegseth stressed the narrow scope of the mission: “This mission was not and has not been about regime change.”

But Trump muddied the waters in a Truth Social post hours later. “It’s not politically correct to use the term, ‘Regime Change,’” he wrote, “but if the current Iranian Regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn’t there be a Regime change??? MIGA!!!”

The operation was met with mixed reactions on Capitol Hill, with many of the president’s allies applauding his boldness while Democrats—and some Republicans—expressed concerns about the legal authorization for the strikes. “Donald Trump’s decision to launch direct military action against Iran without congressional approval is a clear violation of the Constitution, which grants the power to declare war explicitly to Congress,” Rep. Jim Himes, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said in a statement. “It is impossible to know at this stage whether this operation accomplished its objectives. We also don’t know if this will lead to further escalation in the region and attacks against our forces, events that could easily pull us even deeper into a war in the Middle East.”

Whether the U.S. widens its war aims will likely be determined by the Iranian response. While American officials have urged Tehran not to retaliate for the initial strikes, the Islamic Republic may be gearing up for an escalation. Iran’s parliament voted on Sunday to close the Strait of Hormuz, a vital chokepoint for the world’s oil and gas supply—though there are currently no indications that Iran has followed through on the threat—and U.S. military bases and embassies across the Middle East are bracing for the possibility of attacks from either Iran or its network of regional proxies. And far from its own borders, Iranian officials have reportedly threatened to activate sleeper cells to carry out terrorist plots within the United States.

But Trump has vowed to respond overwhelmingly in the event of an Iranian attack, and with the taboo of directly striking the Islamic Republic now broken, Tehran is likely inclined to believe him. “After this attack, they know that the president’s willing to hit Iran,” Elliott Abrams, a senior fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and former national security official in several Republican presidential administrations, told TMD. “And if they kill Americans, he will hit them very, very hard.”

Iran can also continue to direct attacks at Israel. Hours after the U.S. operation on Sunday, the country launched more than 40 ballistic missiles at urban centers across Israel, damaging several buildings—including a nursing home—and wounding 86 people. And Jerusalem’s strikes on Iran show no signs of slowing, particularly with America’s vocal support. During his address after the U.S. strikes, Trump thanked Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by name: “We worked as a team like perhaps no team has ever worked before, and we’ve gone a long way to erasing this horrible threat to Israel.”

But that threat might not be totally eradicated. While the U.S. mission targeted enrichment sites, senior U.S. officials have since acknowledged that they don’t know what became of the enriched uranium itself. Still, they argue, the immediate threat of a nuclear-armed Iran has been significantly degraded following the destruction of other components necessary to make a bomb. And Israeli intelligence would likely pick up on any Iranian efforts to use that fuel to move toward weaponization. 

During a press conference on Sunday, Netanyahu alluded to insight into the possible whereabouts of Iran’s 400-kilogram stockpile of enriched uranium. “We’ve been following that very closely,” he told reporters. “It’s an important component of a nuclear program. It’s not the sole component, it’s not a sufficient component, but it is an important component. And we have interesting intel on that, which you’ll excuse me if I don’t share with you.”

The American attack also sent a clear message to Iran that strikes are on the table if it doesn’t voluntarily abandon what remains of its nuclear program. The Islamic Republic now finds itself in an impossible situation: Succumbing to U.S. demands would project weakness to its people, but continuing to fight a losing battle risks further undermining regime stability. “Trump wanted to engage in coercive diplomacy to force the Islamic Republic to make a choice: It could preserve its regime or have a nuclear program. It can’t have both,” Jason Brodsky, the policy director at United Against Nuclear Iran, told TMD. “The Islamic Republic, however, decided to risk a military strike rather than agree to the president’s terms, and so now it’s in a deeper hole than it was 24 hours ago.”

And abandoning the country’s nuclear program now would be an admission by Tehran that enduring decades of crippling sanctions served no purpose beyond impoverishing and isolating the Iranian people. “The prestige of the regime has really been damaged a lot,” Abrams said. “If you’re an Iranian citizen, what have these people done for you? They’ve been there 46 years, and if you compare their neighbors—the Emirates, for example, or Saudi Arabia—you have governments that are trying to develop the economy and change the country.” 

Brodsky concurred. “This regime is a threat not only to the region and to the United States, but also to the Iranian people,” he said. “But it’s going to be up to the Iranian people to decide their own future. With the regime weakened, that does open up potential opportunities, but it’s not going to happen overnight.”

“We’re buying time here,” he added. “There are no happy endings with the Islamic Republic.”

Worth Your Time

• As Trump hints at the possibility of regime change in Iran, the question naturally arises: How would the Islamic Republic fall? “There are many paths to regime change in Iran,” Eric Edelman, Reuel Marc Gerecht, and Ray Takeyh wrote in Foreign Affairs late last week. “In all cases of regime change, the indispensable preconditions for success are that the government becomes weaker and the populace becomes bolder. … In the past week, Israel has done a significant amount to establish the first condition. It has not just disabled key Iranian nuclear facilities but also essentially decapitated Iran’s military leadership.” Still, they explained, “Israel will have to do a lot more to shatter the coercive powers of the theocracy’s police state—and do so without military actions that kill large numbers of civilians, especially women and children.” Even then, regime change does not happen overnight: “Once Iran is disarmed, Israel and the United States might be tempted to walk away and look elsewhere. It is precisely at that moment that it should instead increase pressure on the regime.”
• Free markets: What are they good for? Writing in Project Syndicate, Michael Strain argued that they’re more than a mere tool. “In a recent interview with The New York Times … [Vice President J.D.] Vance made clear his belief that ‘the market economy is the best way of provisioning goods and services and coordinating people across a very complex society,’ but the market, in his view, is a ‘tool,’ rather than ‘the purpose of American politics.’ Is he right? Is the market merely a tool—a means to an end? Or should a free and well-functioning market be an end in itself? These seemingly esoteric questions underpin many policy disagreements in the United States,” Strain wrote. “Market-oriented policymakers and commentators are reflexively concerned about laws or regulations that might impede economic efficiency, whereas the progressive left and the right-wing ‘Make America Great Again’ movement lack that impulse—and, like Vance, are often dismissive of it. But advancing market efficiency should be a goal of government. Vance is right that markets are the best way to allocate scarce resources and coordinate economic behavior. Because their smooth functioning generates greater prosperity, making markets free and efficient is, in fact, to use Vance’s language, a ‘purpose of American politics.’”

Presented Without Comment

New York Times: Sheltering In A Bunker, Iran’s Supreme Leader Prepares For The Worst

Wary of assassination, Iran’s supreme leader mostly speaks with his commanders through a trusted aide now, suspending electronic communications to make it harder to find him, three Iranian officials familiar with his emergency war plans say.

Ensconced in a bunker, the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has picked an array of replacements down his chain of military command in case more of his valued lieutenants are killed.

And in a remarkable move, the officials add, Ayatollah Khamenei has even named three senior clerics as candidates to succeed him should he be killed, as well—perhaps the most telling illustration of the precarious moment he and his three-decade rule are facing.

Also Presented Without Comment

Axios: LA Dodgers To Donate $1m To Help Immigrants Hit By ICE Raids

In the Zeitgeist

Movie and television writers have long relied on cloning technology—the science of using DNA samples to reproduce genetic copies—to further the plot of their scripts, as in classics such as Jurassic Park, Star Wars, and Futurama. 

Unfortunately, advertisers seem to have taken note. Liquid Death is now selling empty iced tea cans, drank—and autographed—by Ozzy Osbourne, containing “trace amounts” of the heavy metal rock star’s DNA and marketed as a “can of infinitely recyclable Ozzy.”

Let Us Know

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