Will Iran emulate Ukraine?
Elimination of enriched Uranium production is not the end game
While Israel appears to have emasculated Iran’s military and weapons-grade Uranium production successfully, that country’s intentions to produce or use weapons-grade Uranium 235 remains, for the moment, intact. But even after our B-2 bombers dropped the dreaded MOP devices, apparently destroying the Fordow facility 90 meters underground, Iran’s current government remains a nuclear power.
In two prior essays I reviewed possible secondary strategies that Iran might have been pursuing other than punishing or destroying Israel via a multilateral rain of missiles and drones from her proxies and her motherland. Those proxies, Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis (again, why all the H names?) have themselves been denuded of their more localized missile and drone capabilities. Iran’s conventional ballistic missile systems, not yet intercontinental but holding all of the Middle East hostage to conventional explosives and readily converted to delivering nuclear payloads, will no longer be viable at the rate the Israelis are destroying their launch facilities. Distance and lack of direct land or sea access prevent Iran from direct military action, along with the continuing decapitation of their military leadership. Russian interest in support is deflected by their own war in Ukraine, the blitzkrieg success of the Israeli campaign, and Donald Trump’s embrace of the need for military elimination of Iran’s nuclear program. Any ongoing destruction of Iran’s oil refining and oil producing capacity along with economic sanctions dims both China’s and Russia’s direct economic aid. Iran seemingly, with or without U.S. intervention, has no way out after destruction of their only lever for international diplomacy. Nor, contrary to my two misbegotten posts about their actions and intentions, do they appear to be good students of military tactics and strategy. But Russian and Ukraine may be giving them an opportunistic lesson in desperation warfare.
We must remember that Iran’s government is an unelected theocracy, and as such no conceivable act is evil as long as it serves their interpretations of their religion. They are Eric Hoffer’s True Believers, limited only by their instinct for self-preservation at the expense of those they rule. Their motivation appears to be destruction of Israel and all Jews on a Koranic scale, domination over all the Middle East (and beyond) with their brand of Islam, and if frustrated in those goals, revenge of the most heinous kind. But what capacity will they have for that revenge, and how could they make it sufficiently horrible to terrorize local and world powers into neglect?
As mentioned, lack of production and enrichment abilities for their Uranium 235 and destruction of their delivery methods does not end their nuclear warfare capability. Israel finally pulled the trigger on eliminating Iran’s potential weapons production after
1) suffering a “Pearl Harbor” attack by an Iranian proxy, Hamas, on October 7, 2023,
2) successfully suppressing Hamas in Gaza and another Iranian agent, Hezbollah, in Lebanon,
3) recognizing that the American President was truly committed to their survival and ready and willing to take decisive action on the Iran question,
4) reading the latest IAEA report of May, 2025 on Iran’s prior actions and current status.
That report documented all the details of perhaps twenty years of Iranian duplicity in dealing with the international community and their clear intention, signaled by their actions, of developing nuclear weapons as soon as possible despite any and all restrictions. Most critically, that report revealed that the Iranians now had approximately 410 kilograms of Uranium 235 enriched to the 60% level, a 50% increase over their stores since February, 2025. The rate of increase is highly significant, and with the further step of enrichment to 90% U-235 provides them with up to ten nuclear weapons. Clearly, Iran was rushing over the threshold to growing mushrooms not just in Haifa, but all over the Middle East. But stopping their efforts at the current level does not remove danger. Unless safely and completely removed from any destroyed facilities, the Uranium remains a potent weapon of mass destruction under Iran’s control.
How would they weaponize these stores of partially enriched Uranium, and why would it represent any danger to others? 60% enriched U-235 is already a weapon, needing only a delivery system.
Uranium at this enrichment level is both a chemical and a radiological weapon. The toxicity data, according to a search on AI Perplexity, “…specifically is limited; risks are extrapolated from lower-enrichment studies and nuclear-material handling guidelines.” Not knowing the specifics of the risks adds to the terror component of its use. As a heavy metal, it is highly toxic to kidney function, causing both severe acute damage and chronic damage both of which may be irreversible. The toxicity accumulates in the kidney tissue, and does not depend on the isotope form of Uranium, just the amount of ingestion or exposure. Imagine thousands of people suddenly entering kidney failure. Sufficient resources to treat this scenario exist no where in the world. As a physician who specialized in nephrology (kidney diseases, dialysis, and transplantation) I can give eyewitness testimony to the horrors of dying gradually of kidney failure (uremia). That chemical toxicity is based in a very small dose of Uranium.
Larger doses are required for radiation toxicity. With higher levels of enrichment, the radiologic risk from U-235 and U-234 increases rapidly. When the U-235 level is at 60% as in the Iranian stockpile of around 900 pounds, the radiation exposure is about 1,000 times the natural background level. External exposure results in significant Gamma and Neutron radiation toxicity, which normally would require heavy shielding with lead, etc., and remote handling methods. Obviously a potent weapon if aerosolized or dumped in water supplies. Useful also as a method of “denying territory” due to contamination. Alpha emissions become responsible for increased lung cancer risks if the Uranium is inhaled. Long term exposure increases the risk of bone cancers.
None of the above indirect weaponization of U-235 denies its utility as a direct nuclear explosive. 60% enrichment is the weapons-grade threshold. 41.7 kilograms, about 10% of the known Iranian stockpile, can fuel a nuclear weapon. The Iranians were well along the path to a working ICBM thanks to technical aid from Russia, China, and North Korea. In recent weeks and months the Iranians had been ramping up their production of lesser ballistic missiles capable of carrying either a nuclear weapon or a nuclear contaminant throughout the Middle East. The latest IAEA assessment notes that, although the three major production facilities for enriched Uranium are largely destroyed, the actual site of the Iranian enriched stockpile is not currently known, as it may have been moved. Absent the use of ballistic missiles whose launch facilities have been largely destroyed by the Israeli Air Force, how would Iran threaten or deliver this extremely dangerous material?
Perhaps by following Ukraine’s ingenious tactical example. Small drones with modest explosives were smuggled into various areas of Russia over a long period of time, then launched by remote control simultaneously, doing severe damage to a significant percentage of Russia’s strategic air force. Iran has very advanced large drone technology, supplying Russia with the same Shahud drones used repeatedly against the Israelis. These are large and fairly slow, thus subject to detection and destruction by Israel’s Iron Dome. But multiple swarms of very small drones carrying modest amounts of U-235 to population centers in Israel or even targeted to water supply sources, etc., might not be easily detected and deflected. Israeli border security probably precludes successful smuggling of such devices into the country, and over 1,000 miles separates Iran from Israel. But Syria remains fractured and unstable, largely run by a former terrorist who also has been the avowed enemy of Israel and Jews. That new pseudo-nation could become yet another client-state, a proxy, for Iran, and enable a radiation attack. Given the relative chaos in much of Syria with several factions holding various areas, plausible deniability would be easy. Iran’s current ruling ethos has remained intact and committed for a half-century with no hints of any change even after their recent decimation. Should the Mullahs, or perhaps the IRGC, continue to rule, they may bide their time on cold revenge.
Only one path is available to prevent not only a gradual return of Iran’s nuclear fission weapons program but also of their akinetic nuclear weapon program. That is the complete removal of all Uranium or other nuclear fuel, enriched or not, from that country, and extremely tight internationally guaranteed prevention of importation of new nuclear material. That seems very unlikely unless the current entire system of government is removed and replaced. Iranians themselves probably do not have the wherewithal to successfully overcome their highly organized military theocracy. No other nation or group of nations is realistically interested in regime change and nation-building given the historical record of European colonization followed by violent collapse of all the pseudo-nations built on Western standards totally foreign to the indigenous peoples of the regions. This war with and by Iran has been asymmetric, intermittently akinetic, and even with current events has no clear end in sight.