The globe held its breath as the United States and Israel conducted a daring and highly orchestrated set of airstrikes against Iran’s most well-guarded nuclear installations—the operation that redrew the Middle Eastern nuclear diplomacy landscape. Years in the planning, the operation combined advanced military technology with intelligence accuracy and global jockeying.
At the heart of this operation was the Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant, buried deep beneath Iran’s mountainous terrain. Located nearly 300 feet underground, Fordow was engineered to survive almost any assault—immune to conventional airstrikes and even resistant to most bunker-buster bombs. As Al Jazeera and other outlets have noted, the site represented Iran’s determination to shield its nuclear program from foreign interference.
To penetrate such a fortress, the U.S. used one of its strongest tools: the GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator. It tips the scales at 30,000 pounds, the world’s most potent bunker-busting bomb—and it can pierce hundreds of feet of reinforced stone before exploding. Only the stealth-capable B-2 Spirit bomber can carry the GBU-57, and that is only two at a time. This gun had undergone more than a decade of testing and fine-tuning before it was judged suitable for a mission such as this.
The raid—Operation Midnight Hammer—was the culmination of 15 years of careful planning. B-2 bombers took a non-stop flight of more than 13,000 miles to strike their targets. They dropped 14 GBU-57 bombs at Fordow and another valuable enrichment facility, said Air Force Gen. Dan Caine. The secrecy was so great that even the families of the flight crews were not informed until the bombers returned safely.
But brute force was not the only approach. The operation entailed a multi-layer plan: cruise missile attacks to disable air defenses, diversionary tactics to confuse Iranian radar, and smooth cooperation among U.S. and Israeli forces. Ultimately, the operation crippled Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities, putting its nuclear progress back by a few years.
Whenever nuclear facilities are attacked, fears immediately arise of possible fallout. But nuclear experts informed the public that danger from mass radiation was negligible. Kathryn Ann Higley, a prominent nuclear engineer, said that the material held in these facilities wasn’t radioactive enough to be a major threat.
The primary concern, she said, was uranium hexafluoride gas, which is poisonous if inhaled in large quantities. But even that was not likely to be long-term damage-causing. UC Berkeley professor Lee Bernstein further opined that any leaked gas would evaporate immediately, and the majority of it would be contained. The International Atomic Energy Agency agreed that radiation levels outside of the damaged buildings remained within normal limits.
Iran was not quiet. It responded to the attack days later with missile strikes against U.S. bases throughout the region. At Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, U.S. and Qatari defenses intercepted the incoming volley using Patriot missile systems—making it the biggest-ever use of such systems in American military history.
Diplomatic aftershocks followed quickly. The United Nations Security Council held an emergency meeting, where the U.S. and UK emphasized that Iran must never acquire a nuclear weapon. Israel, meanwhile, publicly thanked the U.S. for its leadership, while Iran accused both nations of violating international law.
Though the demolition of Fordow and other facilities served a major blow to Iran’s nuclear program, the larger challenge has yet to be addressed. Analysts caution that Iran might still be stockpiling enriched uranium at hidden facilities—closing the door only partially on the possibility of a future revival of its program. There is increasing fear that a clandestine buildup could encourage regional powers like Saudi Arabia to develop nuclear capabilities of their own.
Operation Midnight Hammer was a dramatic and impressive demonstration of both military authority and technological capability, yet it also showed the limitations of power. No levels of firepower, said the UK’s UN representative, can replace diplomacy. With profound mistrust on each side and increasing regional tensions, nuclear talks are uncertain for the future.
Still, this action is one of the most advanced and far-reaching attacks in recent memory—a clear indicator of how much countries are willing to do to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons. And it is a reminder, sobering one: in the world of nuclear politics, where high stakes are played out every day, every action could redefine global security.