U.S. intelligence assessments suggest that President Donald Trump’s war in Iran has done little to slow the country’s nuclear capabilities, according to a report. Ensuring that Iran cannot build a nuclear weapon was one of the key objectives laid out by Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth at the beginning of the war, which started on February 28. Two months on, Tehran’s nuclear program remains broadly unchanged since last year’s U.S. attack, according to Reuters news agency, citing intelligence sources familiar with the matter. The Trump administration’s Operation Midnight Hammer campaign in June 2025 pushed the timeline of the country’s nuclear capabilities back by nine months to a year, and it remains broadly unchanged now as the U.S. military has largely avoided striking nuclear targets this time, according to Reuters. Before last year’s 12-day war, U.S. intelligence agencies estimated that Iran could produce enough bomb-grade uranium to build a bomb in around three to six months, according to the outlet.
Yeah, the scary part of all of this is its likely to reverse much of the progress made for nuclear deproliferation. The reason that deproliferation became possible was because the post-cold war stability of those nations with large stock piles led to enough trust that other nuclear powers did not actually wish to use them that they could all collectively start dismantling them.
Enter Trump 2.0, bump up the crazy from last time but remove the career officials with any amount of sense that tempered his worst notions and replace them with violent, stupid, fascist yes men. Now he’s breaking international laws, invading countries and kidnapping leaders, and preemptively bombing nations he’s not at war with while threatening to kill their entire civilization… all while sitting on the world’s second largest known remaining stock pile. And the country with the most is also in year 4 of an increasingly desperate invasion of Ukraine and butting heads with other nuclear powers.
To say the trust of the world has been shaken is likely an understatement. Those without nuclear weapons are probably justified in wanting them, and those with them are probably wondering if they need more.