In New Assessment, C.I.A. Chief Says U.S. Strikes 'Severely Damaged' Iranian Program

[speak easy]

Source: New York Times

Classified intelligence about the damage to Iran’s nuclear program from U.S. strikes was at the center of a political tempest on Wednesday as spy chiefs pushed out new assessments and President Trump continued to defend his assertion that Iran’s key facilities had been “obliterated.”

The C.I.A. director, John Ratcliffe, said the strikes had “severely damaged” Iran’s nuclear program, and the administration suggested that the initial report, by the Defense Intelligence Agency, was based on preliminary assessments and was already outdated.

The damage was also being assessed by other U.S. spy agencies. No information that has become public from those assessments has supported Mr. Trump’s description of the level of destruction from the U.S. attack, though they all confirmed that the damage had been substantial.

The D.I.A. report was based on information from little more than 24 hours after the American attacks on three of Iran’s nuclear sites. It described the level of damage as ranging from moderate to severe.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/25/us/politics/trump-iran-nuclear.html

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one more agency buckles under

[tulipsandroses]

1. Not only buckling but putting us in more danger. Are they going to change a security threat in the future if trump says

so? This is nuts.

[groundloop]

2. Meanwhile, it's been confirmed that the sky is green and the moon is made of cheese.

[BOSSHOG]

3. Sadly

It’s impossible to severely damage trumps reputation. It has been beyond repair since at least when daddy bought his way out of SERVING HIS COUNTRY. Trumps knows not of service to anything.

[Coolgoober]

4. Just Like On The Apprentice

They have to make the plot fit whatever came out of the big fat orange mouth

[Enter stage left]

5. Well, duh! Of couse it does.

[LizBeth]

6. No one but trumpers gonna believe. Such liars, all of them

[Picaro]

7. Ratcliffe is a rat

[cstanleytech]

8. Sureeeeeedd it for did. nt

[LT Barclay]

9. Not sure why he has allies in the CIA, but all this proves is that there is a faction that is friendly to Trump. But I

already guessed this by the fact that he lived through his first term and was "elected" to a second. So what are they getting from it? Possibly Israeli cover for new incursions in to Iran?

[Bayard]

10. Severely damaged

Wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more.

[JohnnyRingo]

11. Why do I have a feeling we're gonna hear about this again in a couple months?

Someone will crack and admit they fabricated it under pressure or Trump wrote the revised report himself. ..with a sharpie.
It's just too convenient.

[progree]

12. "In medium-strength rock, things looked far different. The GBU-57 could only go around 7.9 meters (about 25 feet)"

Why America's giant bunker-busting bombs may have failed to reach their target, NPR, June 25, 2025

The infographics were everywhere in the run-up to Sunday's early-morning strike on Iran's nuclear facilities by American stealth bombers.

They depicted America's bunker-busting bomb, (snip). the graphics showed it plowing a narrow channel deep beneath the ground — around 60 meters, or 200 feet — and erupting in an illustrated explosion.

(snip)

I went back to take a look at the math from those early studies, and I found it actually was fairly straightforward. The so-called penetration equations have existed since the 1960s . . .

"It depends enormously on the kind of rock," (snip)

When I ran the calculations, using a key equation from that study, I found out that the GBU-57 could go up to 80 meters (262 feet) underground if it was dropped in silty clay.

In medium-strength rock, things looked far different. The GBU-57 could only go around 7.9 meters (about 25 feet) beneath the earth — far short of the 60 meters claimed by the infographics.

More: https://www.mprnews.org/story/2025/06/25/npr-did-america-bunker-busting-bombs-fail-reach-iran-nuclear-target

As an interesting sidelight, back in the Osama Bin Laden Tora Bora days, the U.S. looked at the feasibility of a nuclear bunker buster and scientists found there was no way to get a nuclear weapon nearly deep enough to contain the blast and radioactive fallout, and the program was eventually abandoned.

[Mosby]

13. The IDFs preliminary assessment is that Iran's nuclear program has been set back by years.

As well as their ballistic missle procuction.

[maxsolomon]

14. "Severely damaged" is fine.

It is a subjective metric.

Given Israel's assassinations and bombing campaign, plus the US bunker busters, "Severely Damaged" sounds like what should have been the result.

"Totally obliterated" is hyperbole. Nothing is ever 100%.