Washington — Senior Pentagon officers revealed new particulars concerning the U.S. operation to bomb three nuclear websites in Iran, with the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Workers saying it was the “largest B-2 operational strike in U.S. historical past” and inflicted “extraordinarily extreme injury and destruction” to the targets.
“This was a extremely labeled mission with only a few folks in Washington understanding the timing or nature of this plan,” Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman, stated in a briefing on the Pentagon on Sunday morning detailing the strikes in opposition to the Iranian nuclear websites at Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan.
Caine stated the mission, dubbed Operation Midnight Hammer, included seven B-2 Spirit bombers that flew east from Whiteman Air Power Base in Missouri to Iran. One other group of B-2s flew west over the Pacific to behave as decoys — information experiences emerged over the course of the day Saturday {that a} group of the bombers have been headed to the U.S. base in Guam.
In the meantime, the 18-hour flight east by the bombers that may drop payloads on Iran required a number of in-flight refuelings because the planes crossed the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. The bombers met up with U.S. fighter jets and help plane as soon as over land within the Center East, executing a “complicated, tightly timed maneuver,” Caine stated.
Map reveals Iran targets, Operation Midnight Hammer flight path
Caine spoke in entrance of a map displaying the flight path of the plane, and the timeline of key occasions within the operation:
Protection Division
At about 5 p.m. ET Saturday, simply earlier than the plane entered Iranian airspace, a U.S. submarine launched greater than two dozen Tomahawk cruise missiles in opposition to targets on the website in Isfahan. Because the bombers approached their targets, the U.S. deployed “a number of deception ways, together with decoys,” and fighter jets cleared the airspace forward of them, checking for enemy plane and surface-to-air missiles.
“We’re at the moment unaware of any photographs fired on the U.S. strike bundle on the best way in,” Caine stated.
At about 6:40 p.m. ET, or 2:10 a.m. in Iran, the lead B-2 dropped two “bunker-buster” bombs referred to as the GBU-57 Huge Ordnance Penetrators, or MOPs, on the positioning at Fordo. Over the subsequent 25 minutes, Caine stated, a complete of 14 MOPs can be dropped on targets at Fordo and Natanz. The Tomahawk missiles landed at Isfahan after bombs have been dropped on the 2 different websites. Caine stated no photographs have been fired on the planes as they left Iranian airspace.
“Iran’s fighters didn’t fly, and it seems that Iran’s surface-to-air missile methods didn’t see us. All through the mission, we retained the factor of shock,” Caine stated.
“Greater than 125 U.S. plane participated on this mission,” Caine stated, together with the B-2 bombers, fighter jets, refueling planes and surveillance plane. Greater than 75 precision-guided weapons have been used within the assault, Caine famous.
“Preliminary battle injury assessments point out that every one three websites sustained extraordinarily extreme injury and destruction,” Caine stated, noting {that a} full evaluation will take time.
The chairman warned Iran in opposition to taking any retaliatory motion for the strikes.
“Our forces stay on excessive alert and are totally postured to reply to any Iranian retaliation or proxy assaults, which might be an extremely poor alternative,” Caine stated. “We are going to defend ourselves.”
Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth known as the assault “an unimaginable and overwhelming success.”
“The order we acquired from our commander in chief was centered, it was highly effective, and it was clear,” Hegseth stated on the briefing alongside Caine. “We devastated the Iranian nuclear program, but it surely’s price noting that the operation didn’t goal Iranian troops or the Iranian folks.”
He added: “The operation President Trump deliberate was daring, and it was sensible, displaying the world that American deterrence is again. When this president speaks, the world ought to pay attention.”
“Our B-2s went out and in … and again with out the world understanding in any respect,” Hegseth stated. “In that means it was historic. A strike that included the longest B-2 Spirit bomber mission since 2001, and the primary operational employment of the MOP, a Huge Ordnance Penetrator.”
Mr. Trump introduced Saturday night that the U.S. had launched strikes in opposition to Iran. He stated in a nationwide handle later Saturday evening that the websites “have been utterly and completely obliterated.”
Flanked by Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vice President JD Vance on the White Home, the president described the strikes as a “spectacular navy success” and warned of “far better” assaults if Iran doesn’t “make peace.”
“If peace doesn’t come rapidly, we’ll go after these different targets with precision, pace and ability, most of them could be taken out in a matter of minutes,” he stated. “There is not any navy on the earth that might have accomplished what we did tonight, not even shut. There has by no means been a navy that might do what occurred just a bit whereas in the past.”
