Washington — On the same day that President Trump ordered Saturday’s strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, a U.S. intelligence agency assessed that Iran could make a nuclear weapon in three to eight months — but there was no indication that it had decided to do so, CBS News has learned.
The intelligence summary, issued Saturday for the military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, found that Iran could build a nuclear device in months if it did not run into technical or logistical delays, two American intelligence sources familiar with the document told CBS News.
But at that time, the summary did not assess that Iran had made a decision to sprint toward a nuclear weapon — lining up with U.S. assessments for years.
Similar assessments were made in the days leading up to the U.S. strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, and in the days afterward. The U.S. airstrikes came amid a wider dayslong Israeli offensive against Iranian nuclear facilities, though Mr. Trump announced Monday that Iran and Israel had agreed to a ceasefire.
The intelligence summary also found that Iranian officials had discussed moving canisters of highly enriched uranium into car trunks and storing them in public parking lots to avoid destruction.
Iran has increased its stockpiles of highly enriched uranium in recent months, sparking concerns among both Iran’s adversaries and international watchdogs. The country has enriched uranium up to 60% purity, which is only a short step away from the 90% level generally used in nuclear weapons.
Mr. Trump said last week Iran was “very close to having” a nuclear weapon, and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said Iran “is at the point that it can produce a nuclear weapon within weeks to months, if they decide to finalize the assembly.”
The head of U.S. Central Command, Gen. Michael Kurilla, testified in mid-June that if Iran were to decide to sprint to a nuclear weapon, it would be able to produce enough weapons-grade material for a simple nuclear weapon in one week and could make enough for 10 nuclear weapons in three weeks.
U.S. intelligence officials have said for years that Iran formally halted its nuclear weapons development program in 2003. In March, the U.S. intelligence community assessed that Iran was not building a nuclear weapon and the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, still had not reauthorized the program, but “pressure has probably built on him to do so” — noting an “erosion of a decades-long taboo on discussing nuclear weapons in public.”
Different agencies in the intelligence community may have their own assessments about what Iran’s nuclear capabilities were prior to the strikes.
Gabbard reiterated that assessment in testimony to Congress earlier this year. But last week, Mr. Trump told reporters Gabbard was “wrong” about whether Iran was building a nuclear weapon, later adding, “I think they were very close to having one.” Gabbard later said she and the president were on the same page, and the media was “taking my testimony out of context.”
The U.S. airstrikes targeted two Iranian uranium enrichment facilities and a nuclear research site, following a dayslong air campaign by Israel, which has alleged Iran is “racing towards a nuclear bomb.” The impact of the weekend strikes by the U.S. is still not clear; the Pentagon offered a preliminary public assessment of the damage soon after the strikes.
“Initial battle damage assessments indicate that all three sites sustained extremely severe damage and destruction,” Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine said Sunday, adding that a full assessment would take time.
Iran, for its part, has long denied that it intends to build nuclear weapons, and insists its uranium enrichment program is meant for peaceful purposes.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio told CBS News’ “Face The Nation” on Sunday that the Iranian sites targeted in the U.S. strikes were linked to Iran’s “nuclear weaponization ambitions.” When asked whether the U.S. believed Khamenei had ordered the building of a nuclear weapon, Rubio called the issue “irrelevant.”
“They have everything they need to build nuclear weapons,” Rubio said.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement, “President Trump and the administration have always been right to say that if Iran chose to make a nuclear bomb, they could do so within weeks, which obviously poses an imminent threat to the US and the world.”
“[T]hanks to President Trump’s strong leadership and the incredibly successful military strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, their capacity to build a nuclear bomb has been obliterated and the world can sleep easy at night,” she added.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence referred any questions to the Defense Department, which did not respond to CBS News’ request for comment.
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Eleanor Watson
contributed to this report.
