On the tenth day of Israel's operation to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities, the United States joined in.
Although on Thursday, June 19, White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt was insisting that Donald Trump was giving Tehran an additional two weeks to finally come to the negotiating table, early Sunday morning, June 22, the US launched combined strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities in Fordow, Natanga and Isfahan.
In Fordow, Iran's most secure nuclear facility is located in a mountain at a depth of 100 meters or more. The uranium enrichment facility in Natanga is also underground and protected by highly reinforced concrete. In addition, Tehran's underground nuclear facilities are connected by tunnels with 90-degree turns. The Israeli army, unlike the United States, does not have weapons in its arsenal that can hit such targets.
Joining Israel's operation, U.S. B-2 bombers dropped 13-ton GBU-57 bunker buster bombs on the Fordow site, marking their first combat use anywhere in the world. Subsequent Maxar satellite images show six impact craters along a ridgeline above the underground nuclear facility. The U.S. also dropped similar bombs on the Natanga site, and hit it and another site in Isfahan with 30 Tomahawk missiles.
Immediately after these strikes, Trump rushed to declare that Iran's nuclear program was over. But later, the American command noted serious damage to the facilities. Experts warn that it will take time to accurately analyze the consequences of the bombings. Therefore, it is premature to claim that the centrifuges have been destroyed, as well as the fuel needed to enrich uranium and create an atomic bomb. Vice President J.D. Vance has already stated that “the United States is not at war with Iran, but with Iran's nuclear program.” And US Secretary of State Marco Rubio added that America does not seek to change the regime in Tehran.
So, will Iran retaliate against US bases in the Middle East? How will the US joining Israel's deal to destroy Tehran's nuclear program affect oil prices? But could a wider conflict break out in the Middle East? Read on the website TSN.ua.
Trump went for broke: Russia and China “dumped” Iran
I may or may not do it. Nobody knows what I will do. But I can say this: Iran has a lot of problems and wants to negotiate.” Thus, Donald Trump on Wednesday, June 18, answered journalists' questions about the possible participation of the United States in Israeli strikes on Iranian targets. This statement came a few days after American officials did not rule out that the next 24-48 hours would be decisive. And, despite the statement by White House spokesperson Caroline Levitt about “two weeks”, less than 30 hours later Trump gave the order to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities.
Subsequently, the American media, citing sources in the White House, will write that the statement about “two weeks” was a diversionary maneuver. Trump made the final decision on Friday evening, June 20, while playing golf at his golf club in New Jersey.
“The timing was right. The Ayatollah [Khamenei – Ed.] gave Trump and the United States the middle finger. And it came at a cost,” a confidant of the US president told Axios. Another US official added that just as the US bombers were striking, Trump's special envoy for the Middle East Steve Witkoff sent a message to Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi that this was a one-off operation, exclusively against Iran's nuclear program.
In an address to the nation after the strikes, Trump announced the complete destruction of all three Iranian nuclear facilities in Fordow, Natan and Isfahan. Defense Secretary Pete Gegset also said that Iran's nuclear ambitions had been destroyed. At the same time, a little later, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Kaine said there was “significant damage and destruction.”
“There were no Iranian fighters flying, and it appears that Iranian surface-to-air missile systems did not see us during the entire mission. We maintained the element of surprise. The final battle damage assessment will take some time, but the initial assessment indicates that all three sites sustained extremely severe damage and destruction,” Kane said.
On Sunday and Monday, June 22-23, everyone tried to predict how Iran might respond to the US joining the Israeli strikes. For Tehran even made statements about the US “direct entry into the war.” However, neither the UN Security Council meeting nor Abbas Araghchi’s trip to Moscow on Monday, June 23, gave Iran any hope that its allies in the “axis of evil” were ready to come to its aid.
China limited itself to a statement by its Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian about “strong condemnation” and “an early ceasefire.” Moscow reminded Tehran that it had once offered to jointly develop air defense systems, but Iran had refused. The strategic partnership agreement that Russia and Iran signed in January 2025, the Kremlin said, does not provide for military assistance in the event of an external attack on one of the parties.
What's Next: Oil Prices and Global War
Many analysts and experts were confident that, for a number of important reasons, Trump would not give the order to attack Iran's nuclear facilities.
Firstly, and TSN.ua has already written about this, according to a YouGov and Economist poll, 60% of Americans were against US intervention in the conflict between Israel and Iran. This idea was supported by the ultra-conservative and pro-Russian wing of MAGA.
Excerpts from a podcast by the famous American propagandist Tucker Carlson, who went to Moscow last year to record an interview with Putin and the Republican Senator from Texas Ted Cruz, have flown around the Internet, where Carlson criticizes the possibility of the United States joining Israel's attacks on the population of Iran and the nuclear facility. And Ted Cruz found it difficult to answer that about 90.6 million people live in Iran.
Moreover, before ordering the strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, Trump had lunch with Steve Bannon, a former White House strategist and feared adviser to Trump during his first term who spent four months in prison. He, too, had criticized the possibility of the United States joining the operation to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities. So after that lunch, many assumed that Trump would not make that risky decision after all.
Secondly, everyone expects a retaliatory move from Tehran. This could include Iranian missile strikes on US Navy ships and US bases in Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, Iraq and the UAE. of the world's oil exports and up to 20% of liquefied natural gas, including from the Persian Gulf countries. oil sales, getting more money to continue the war.
“We'll see what Iran decides. If they call and say they're ready to meet, we're ready to do that. The president has made that clear from the beginning. He prefers a diplomatic solution to this issue. But he also told them we have 60 days to make progress or else something else will happen,” Marco Rubio warned Iran on Sunday, June 22.
The US Secretary of State also confirmed that America does not aim to change the regime in Tehran. However, Trump effectively denied this in a post on his social network TruthSocial: “It is not politically correct to use the term ‘regime change’, but if the current Iranian regime is incapable of ‘Make Iran Great Again’, then why not have a regime change?”
