‘Simply rhetoric’: Trump’s Iran strike claims questioned

The U.S. attack on three Iranian nuclear facilities has jolted global diplomacy and heightened fears of a broader regional conflict, with observers warning that the future of nuclear non-proliferation may be at risk.

The attack, which employed long-range bombers and 30,000-pound bunker-buster bombs, marked a dramatic escalation in the simmering conflict between Israel and Iran.

But it also drew the U.S. directly into a war it had long sought to avoid.

In an interview on CTV’s Question Period Sunday, former head of Canada’s military, retired general Tom Lawson said he wasn’t surprised by the attack despite U.S. President Donald Trump’s public reluctance to engage in war.

“Certainly, Mr. Trump is not often constant in a lot of his points of view,” Lawson said. “But this is one that he has been consistent about for a decade, or more.”

The Pentagon confirmed the use of 14 Massive Ordnance Penetrators in strikes on Natanz, Fordow and Isfahan. Although Trump claimed the facilities were “completely obliterated,” the military’s battle damage assessment remains incomplete.

“What the (U.S.) president said last night about it having been a massive success was simply rhetoric,” said Lawson, who served as chief of the defence staff from 2012 to 2015. “Even if there is complete damage to Fordo and Natanz and Isfahan, there may be other sites deep in mountains elsewhere, that will allow the Iranians to restart their program.”

Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization and the United Nations nuclear watchdog reported no immediate radioactive contamination, but new questions have emerged about Iran’s uranium stockpile and its remaining capabilities. Some officials in Tehran have claimed nuclear material was moved before the strikes.

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Meanwhile, The Trump administration has framed the mission as a tightly controlled operation aimed solely at degrading Iran’s nuclear capacity.

“The Secretary (of Defence) was reflecting the (U.S.) president’s indications that this was a very limited and focused strike in an effort to minimize the response, at least to the United States,” said Lawson. “I think the hope is that the Americans can back out having done significant damage, that will buy time for something good to happen.”

But he warned that Iran could retaliate in ways that drag the U.S. deeper into the conflict — from targeting American troops stationed across the Middle East, to closing the Strait of Hormuz and sparking a global oil crisis.

“This is a very prideful regime,” Lawson said. “Khamenei has been a true believer for 50 years and if he is successful in killing Americans and … closing, perhaps the Straits of Hormuz and starting an oil war around the world, I think that will require further American involvement — and where it spirals from there becomes a little more difficult to predict.”

With files from The Associated Press