Forces arguing against President Donald Trump's strikes over a week ago, have suggested Iran was not close to making a nuclear bomb, but now they are switching gears, saying Iran remains dangerously close to being able to make a nuclear bomb.
International Atomic Energy Agency Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi agreed: "The capacities they have are there."
"They can have, you know, in a matter of months, I would say, a few cascades of centrifuges spinning and producing enriched uranium, or less than that," Grossi told CBS News' "Face the Nation" on Sunday.
"But as I said, frankly speaking, one cannot claim that everything has disappeared and there is nothing there."
The three sites struck in Trump's B-2 Stealth bomber missions delivered "severe damage," according to Grossi, making Trump, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Dan Caine's statements true, but it is also true that Iran has to come to the table to give up future nuclear weapons aspirations and allow full vetting of their nuclear centrifuges and uranium enrichment.
"It is clear that there has been severe damage, but it's not total damage, first of all," Grossi told host Margaret Brennan. "And secondly, Iran has the capacities there; industrial and technological capacities. So if they so wish, they will be able to start doing this again.
"We have to go back to the table and have a technically sound solution to this. Otherwise, this will come hit us again, in terms of a situation which is not well-clarified. And this is an opportunity. We do have an opportunity now."
Like former President Barack Obama's nuclear deal architect John Kerry said recently you "cannot bomb away" nuclear weapons ideology, Grossi also warned you cannot "disinvent" nuclear weapons designs.
"Iran had a very vast ambitious program, and part of it may still be there, and if not, there is also the self-evident truth that the knowledge is there," Grossi continued. "The industrial capacity is there. Iran is a very sophisticated country in terms of nuclear technology, as is obvious. So you cannot disinvent this.
"You cannot undo the knowledge that you have or the capacities that you have. It's a huge country, isn't it? So I think this should be the incentive that we all must have to understand that military operations or not, you are not going to solve this in a definitive way militarily."
Ultimately, Iran must relent to "trust but verify" IAEA investigators.
"You are going to have an agreement," he said. "You are going to have an inspection system that will give everybody, everybody in the region and elsewhere, the assurances that we can- we can definitely turn the page."
But Grossi admitted, before the strikes, Iran was not being fully compliant and being secretive.
"There were deficits, and we were referring to those in the sense that there were some things that they were not clarifying to us," he said. "But our inspection work was constant.
"In particular, in this sensitive area of the number of centrifuges and the amount of material, we had perfect view."
But, Iran exposed itself but not being fully open to verification, Grossi concluded.
"What I was concerned about is that there were other things that were not clear," he said. "For example, we had found traces of uranium in some places in Iran, which were not the normal declared facilities. And we were asking for years, Why did we find these traces of enriched uranium in place x, y or z?
"And we were simply not getting credible answers. If there was material – where is this material? So there could be even more. We don't know. This is why it is, I'm sorry I'm repeating it for the third time, I think we need to go back."
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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