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The Trump administration is scrambling to spin a leaked Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) report that pours cold water on President Donald Trump’s bold claim that U.S. airstrikes “completely and totally obliterated” three Iranian nuclear facilities, like never before in the history of airstrikes. The report, splashed across CNN and The New York Times, suggests the strikes, part of Operation Midnight Hammer, only set Iran’s nuclear program back by a few months, not the knockout blow Trump touted.
In a national address right after the strikes, Trump didn’t hold back, [does he ever?] declaring the sites at Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan “completely and totally obliterated.” He doubled down Saturday, calling the operation “very successful” and insisting Iran’s nuclear enrichment capabilities were toast. But the DIA’s assessment, based on a U.S. Central Command battle damage report, says otherwise, claiming Iran’s stash of enriched uranium survived the onslaught, according to seven sources briefed on the findings.
The administration is now in full damage-control mode, with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth dismissing the DIA report as “low confidence.” That’s Pentagon-speak for “we don’t have enough data to be sure,” a point echoed by experts.
“Low confidence means the analyst is not sure of the accuracy of their assessment,” said retired Navy Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery, now a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. “This is frequent with a Quick Look 24-hour assessment like this one.”
Montgomery’s colleague, piled on, noting that “low confidence assessments are usually issued when key facts have yet to be verified, which certainly applies in this case.” Translation: the DIA report might be more of a rough draft than a definitive verdict.
But the skepticism isn’t just coming from the leaked report. Experts are cautioning against snap judgments, both optimistic or pessimistic.
Dan Shapiro, former U.S. ambassador to Israel and now with the Atlantic Council, told Fox News Digital that early assessments, like the DIA’s, likely rely on satellite imagery alone. “That’s one piece of the puzzle of how you would really make this assessment,” Shapiro said. “You’d really want to have to test all the other streams of intelligence, from signals intelligence, human intelligence, other forms of monitoring the site, potentially visits by International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors, potentially visits by other people. So that’s going to take days to weeks to get a real assessment.”
Still, Shapiro’s not entirely bearish. “But I think it’s likely that if the munitions performed as expected, that significant damage was done, and would set back the program significantly,” he added.
Gen. Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, tried to thread the needle Sunday, saying initial battle damage assessments showed “all three sites sustained extremely severe damage and destruction” but admitted a final verdict would “take some time.” That’s a far cry from Trump’s chest-thumping.
The strikes, which followed escalating Israel-Iran tensions, dropped serious firepower, over 14 30,000-lb. bombs, according to Rob Greenway, a former Trump National Security Council deputy assistant now at The Heritage Foundation.
Greenway says the sheer volume of ordnance means the facilities are likely “no longer serviceable.” “We were putting twice the amount of ordnance required to achieve the desired effect, just to make sure that we didn’t have to go back,” he told Fox News Digital. “There’s virtually no mathematical probability in which either facility can be used again by Iran for the intended purpose, if at all, which again means that everything now is within Israel’s capability to strike if that’s required.”
But assessing the damage isn’t straightforward. Greenway noted the strikes targeted underground facilities, which complicates things. “Each of these are one piece of a much larger puzzle, and you’re trying to gauge the ultimate effect of the entirety of the puzzle, not just one particular strike,” he said. Add in Israel’s prior strikes on the same sites, and it’s a messy intelligence jigsaw puzzle that could take “one or two months” to piece together with higher confidence.
Michael Allen, a former National Security Council senior director under George W. Bush, said the intelligence picture will get “richer” soon. “Stuff is pouring in, and we’re out there collecting it, and they’re trying to hustle it to the White House as soon as possible,” he said.
Meanwhile, the White House is as angry as a bag of cats about the leak.
Press secretary Karoline Leavitt called the leaker “irresponsible” and vowed the FBI would hunt them down. “That person was irresponsible with it,” Leavitt told reporters Thursday. “And we need to get to the bottom of it. And we need to strengthen that process to protect our national security and protect the American public.”
Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, weighing in on Fox News’ Special Report, outlined the broader impact of Operation Midnight Hammer on the Middle East, but the real question is whether Trump’s victory lap was premature. For now, the administration’s battling a narrative that its big win might not be as big as advertised, and it’s got a leaked report to thank for the headache.
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