Table Stakes - June 23rd

Good morning everyone,

I’m Daniel, and welcome to Table Stakes!

Here’s a look at today’s topics:

• Analysis: How Effective Was the US Attack on Iran?

• DHS Warns Of Sharp Rise In Chinese-Made Signal Jammers It Calls 'Tools Of Terrorism'

• A Confidential Brief to the ICC Accuses Russia-Linked Wagner of Promoting Atrocities in West Africa

Analysis: How Effective Was the US Attack on Iran?

_{By: Daniel Murrah, Staff Writer for Atlas}

The United States' direct military action on Iran's nuclear facilities on June 21-22, 2025, is undeniably a turning point in Middle Eastern geopolitics. President Donald Trump said that the US "successfully" hit three nuclear sites in Iran: Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan. He said that Iran's most important nuclear sites were "completely and fully obliterated." This analysis looks at how well the operation worked in three important areas: immediate tactical success, strategic nuclear impact, and long-term effects on the region.

Tactical Execution

The attacks hit some of Iran’s most strategically important and fortified nuclear sites, dealing a massive blow to Iran’s nuclear aspirations. The operation focused on three parts of Iran’s nuclear program: the Fordow enrichment facility, the Natanz enrichment complex, and the Isfahan conversion site. These targets were selected by the United States due to their direct connection and support for Iran’s growing nuclear capabilities.

From a military execution perspective, the strikes went perfectly. The US sent several B-2 stealth bombers to Iran with GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrators, which are 30,000-pound bombs designed to break through terrain and reinforced concrete used to conceal and protect Iran’s nuclear infrastructure. The attacks were precise, perfectly-timed and perfectly-coordinated, indicating deep preparation between the United States and Israel over the course of several months leading up to the operation.

Trump called the operation a massive success. There were no American deaths, and the strikes did what they were supposed to do: destroy everything. Intelligence reports say that the damage is terrible: centrifuge cascades, uranium conversion systems, and important infrastructure are all in ruins. The pinpoint accuracy caused the most damage to nuclear and military targets while leaving civilian areas unharmed, showing how precise the operation was.

Impact on Iran’s Capabilities

The nuclear aspect of these attacks is their most important strategic success. It looks like Iran's nuclear program, which took twenty years and countless dollars to build, was completely destroyed in just a few hours. The targeted sites each had their own purposes but worked together to make Iranian nuclear proliferation possible. The destruction of multiple crucial links in this chain has effectively destroyed the country's ability to enrich uranium.

Fordow, which is underground and protected by the military, is thought to be Iran's safest nuclear facility. It has advanced centrifuge arrays that could turn uranium into weapons-grade levels. Its elimination gets rid of Iran's most advanced enrichment capability and takes away what many experts thought was the regime's most threatening nuclear asset. Iran's main uranium enrichment plant, Natanz, had thousands of centrifuges and was the industrial backbone of the nuclear program. The destruction of the plant has put an end to Iran's potential to make a lot of enriched uranium.

Isfahan was also a strategic target since it was Iran's main uranium conversion site, where natural uranium is turned into uranium hexafluoride gas for enrichment. Iran can't put raw materials into any rebuilt enrichment program without this conversion capacity. All three sites being destroyed at the same time makes a big hole in Iran's nuclear fuel cycle that can't be easily or quickly fixed.

Experts say that it would take a lot of time, money, and international procurement networks to recreate these capabilities. Iran may have trouble doing this because of stricter sanctions and surveillance. The strikes have effectively reset Iran's nuclear schedule, pushing any possible weapons capability years into the future instead of months. This strategic victory deals with what many officials thought was the biggest security danger in the Middle East.

Long-Term Considerations

The broader effects of these strikes go far beyond their immediate military and nuclear effects. They could change the way countries in the Middle East interact with each other for years to come. The operation is the first time the US military has directly attacked Iranian nuclear facilities. This is a line that past administrations were not ready to cross. This escalation changes the strategic relationship between Washington and Tehran in a big way and sends strong messages to other countries in the region and around the world.

Iran's response, calling the attacks "outrageous" strikes on "peaceful nuclear installations" that will have "everlasting consequences," reveals just how devastating the attack has already been for Iranian aspirations. For a nation that wants to run the Middle East as a bully, similar to Russia’s Putin or China’s Xi, suffering a setback of this magnitude is devastating.

But for these strikes to work in the long run, continued international pressure will be necessary to prevent an Iranian bounceback. The stories of Russia, North Korea and others show that military force alone cannot deter a totalitarian regime with international aspirations. Lasting economic, cultural, and strategic pressure in the form of sanctions and other mechanisms is the only way to keep Iran’s abilities at bay.

While the immediate effects of this attack cannot be understated, attention must now be given to the future of the struggle in the Middle East. Whether Israel will use this newfound grace period to expand its own pressure on Iran, or Russia will increase its support for Iran to bounce back faster, the world will watch to see just how long this intermission lasts.

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