Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Lt. Gen. Dan “Razin” Caine held a press conference from the Pentagon early Sunday morning to relay details on the U.S. military’s successful strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.
“Last night, on President Trump’s orders, U.S. Central Command conducted a precision strike in the middle of the night against three nuclear facilities in Iran Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan in order to destroy or severely degrade Iran’s nuclear program,” Hegseth said Sunday morning from the Pentagon.
“It was an incredible and overwhelming success. The order we received from our commander in chief was focused. It was powerful, and it was clear we devastated the Iranian nuclear program. But it’s worth noting the operation did not target Iranian troops or the Iranian people for the entirety of his time in office,” Hegseth continued.
The press conference was held following President Donald Trump addressing the nation at 10 pm on Saturday evening, just hours after he announced the successful strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.
“The mission demonstrated to the world the level of joint and allied integration that speak to the strength of our alliance and our joint forces. As President Trump has stated, the United States does not seek war, but let me be clear we will act swiftly and decisively when our people, our partners or our interests are threatened. Iran should listen to the United States and know that he means it,” Hegseth continued.
Caine addressed the media and explained the strikes, dubbed “Operation Midnight Hammer,” included the use of submarines, dozens of Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles, and the “longest B-2 spirit bomber mission since 2001.”
“At approximately 5 p.m. Eastern Standard Time last night and just prior to the strike package entering Iran, a U.S. submarine in the Central Command area of responsibility launched more than two dozen Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles against key surface infrastructure targets as often as the Operation Midnight Hammer strike package entered Iranian airspace. The US employed several deception tactics,” Caine said.
“This was a highly classified mission with very few people in Washington knowing the timing or nature of this plan, I’ll refer you to the graphic on the side as I walk you through some of the operational details. At midnight Friday into Saturday morning, a large B-2 strike package comprised of bombers launched from the continental United States as part of the plan to maintain tactical surprise. Part of the package proceeded to the west and into the Pacific as a decoy. A deception effort, known only to an extremely small number of planners and key leaders here in Washington and in Tampa,” he continued.
TRUMP ADDRESSES NATION ON ‘SPECTACULAR MILITARY SUCCESS’ OF US STRIKES ON IRANIAN NUCLEAR FACILITIES
Trump announced the U.S. had struck a trio of nuclear facilities in Iran via a Truth Social post on Saturday evening, that was not preceded by any media leaks of prior indication such strikes were imminent.
The president ordered U.S. B-2 stealth bombers to carry out the strikes against Iran’s Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan nuclear facilities.
Five to six bunker-buster bombs struck the Fordow nuclear site, Trump told Fox News’ Sean Hannity shortly after announcing the strikes Saturday night.
The Isfahan facility, like Fordow, is believed to be built underground, and required precision targeting and extensive intelligence to successfully strike, Fox News has reported. Meanwhile, thirty Tomahawk missiles were fired against Natanz and Isfahan from U.S. submarines.
Trump later addressed the nation from the White House while flanked by Vice President JD Vance, Hegseth and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, where he announced Iran’s nuclear facilities had been “obliterated” and that the country has been backed into a corner and “must now make peace.”
TRUMP DECLARES ‘VERY SUCCESSFUL ATTACK’ ON IRAN’S NUCLEAR PROGRAM AS US FORCES STRIKE 3 KEY SITES
“Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated,” Trump said. “And Iran, the bully of the Middle East, must now make peace. If they do not. future attacks would be far greater and a lot easier.”
Trump had repeatedly urged Iran to make a deal on its nuclear program before striking its nuclear facilities, but the country pulled out of ongoing talks with the U.S. scheduled for June 15 in Oman and refused to return to the table in the days following. Israel preemptively ordered strikes on Iran June 12 as Israeli intelligence indicated Iran’s nuclear program was rapidly progressing.
“A short time ago, the U.S. military carried out massive precision strikes on the three key nuclear facilities in the Iranian regime: Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan,” Trump said during his address. “Everybody heard those names for years as they built this horribly destructive enterprise. Our objective was the destruction of Iran’s nuclear enrichment capacity, and a stop to the nuclear threat posed by the world’s number one state sponsor of terror. Tonight, I can report to the world that the strikes were a spectacular military success.”
TRUMP PROMISES TO RESPOND WITH ‘FULL STRENGTH AND MIGHT’ OF US MILITARY IF IRAN ATTACKS AMERICA
“For 40 years, Iran has been saying, ‘Death to America. Death to Israel.’ They have been killing our people, blowing off their arms, blowing off their legs with roadside bombs,” Trump continued. “That was their specialty. We lost over a thousand people and hundreds of thousands throughout the Middle East and around the world have died as a direct result of their hate in particular.”
The president said that the U.S. worked like a team with Israel in the lead-up to the strikes
“I want to thank and congratulate Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu. We worked as a team, like perhaps no team has ever worked before, and we’ve gone a long way to erasing this horrible threat to Israel. I want to thank the Israeli military for the wonderful job they’ve done. And most importantly, I want to congratulate the great American patriots who flew those magnificent machines tonight and all of the United States military on an operation the likes of which the world has not seen in many, many decades,” he said.
Israel launched pre-emptive strikes on Iran June 12 after months of attempted and stalled nuclear negotiations and subsequent heightened concern that Iran was advancing its nuclear program. Netanyahu declared soon afterward that the strikes were necessary to “roll back the Iranian threat to Israel’s very survival.”
The Saturday evening strikes were unexpected on Saturday evening, as Trump on Thursday said he would make a decision on Iran within the next two weeks, suggesting such a strike would not unfold over the weekend. While six B-2 bombers that were spotted heading west from Missouri toward Guam on Saturday afternoon were decoys and part of the “misleading tidbits put out there to suggest that maybe President Trump had had put off the decision,” Fox News Chief National Security Correspondent Jennifer Griffin said during an appearance Saturday evening as news broke of the strikes.
“Those six B-2 bombers that were heading west toward Guam, they would not have made it to Iran in time to take part in this strike,” she said while speaking with Fox News’ Bret Baier Saturday evening. “So, that suggests to me that there was an additional B-1 package that perhaps flew eastward from Whiteman Air Force Base. Again, this was all part of the deception. There was a great deal of sort of misleading tidbits put out there to suggest that maybe President Trump had put off the decision and that this would happen two weeks from now.”
Trump earned bipartisan praise from Congressional lawmakers for taking action to prevent Iran, the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism, from achieving nuclear capabilities.
Other members of Congress, however, simultaneously criticized Trump for not asking for Congressional approval ahead of the military strikes and raised concerns of the risk of war.
ISRAEL’S ACTIONS AGAINST IRAN CREATE STRATEGIC OPPORTUNITY FOR US IN NUCLEAR TALKS, EXPERTS SAY
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has yet to comment on the strikes. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, however, said that diplomacy is an unlikely option in the wake of the U.S. strikes.
“Last week, we were in negotiations with the US when Israel decided to blow up that diplomacy. This week, we held talks with the E3/EU when the US decided to blow up that diplomacy,” Araghchi wrote on X. “What conclusion would you draw?”
Araghchi said he’ll travel to Moscow later on Sunday to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin, with whom Iran enjoys “a strategic partnership.”