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Sources: Early U.S. Intel Suggests Strikes Did Not Destroy Iran's Nuclear Sites; Sources: Early U.S. Intel Assessment Suggests Strikes Only Set Back Iran Nuclear Program by Months; Sources: Defense Intel Agency Assesses U.S. Strikes did not Destroy Iran's Nuclear Sites. Aired 3-3:30p ET

Aired June 24, 2025 - 15:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR, THE SOURCE: But, if this is the assessment that stands, as it is right now, and what the DIA found, according to this report, that that undermines what President Trump has been saying publicly about the result and the impact of these strikes and what they had on Iran's nuclear program.

Just this morning, he has been quite defensive about this, saying it's not enough, in his view, to just say that they were sufficiently damaged. He is saying they were completely destroyed and obliterated, and he's been defending the B-2 bombers and the pilots flying those B- 2s that took these bombs over to Iran on Saturday night and dropped them on top of these nuclear sites, at great lengths, as he did as he was leaving the White House today.

So, certainly, it would undermine and undercut what the President himself has been saying. But I do think, as Natasha mentioned there, this is an early and preliminary assessment, as they're still waiting to see what the other findings show. But this was the big question going into this.

And I had actually asked President Trump this when we were on Air Force One last week, coming back from Canada, because the bombs that were used here, Boris and Brianna, had never been used in combat before. Yes, they'd been heavily tested, but they'd never actually been dropped on any site before. And the question I had for the President was, did he have assurances or any guarantees that conducting these U.S. strikes would actually take out Iran's nuclear program.

He told me there were no guarantees in life, but, obviously, that's a key question that we were told he was also asking his officials behind the scene is how would this play out, what would this look like, because, as we know, the President, even with military action in his first term, does go through these assessments in a pretty thorough manner to want to know what the other end of this is going to look like.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Yes, and certainly this is something. Kaitlan, just put into context, because President Trump is there in the Netherlands, as you are there following this very important NATO summit. And he has been, you know, projecting this great success. He's also there at this summit that is so much tailored to him. He's kind of - he's riding a little bit of a high as he's there. So, any sort of perceived slight to what he considers a great success, and so far the holding of this, at least, brief ceasefire so far, how is he going to perceive that?

COLLINS: Yes. And the President has been to NATO summits before where things did not go well. I mean, everyone remembers the Brussels summit of his first term where he walked out of the room at one point. So, often when he comes to these, and there is a new NATO secretary general this time who was sending the President messages earlier today that Trump was then posting screenshots of on Truth Social saying that they were essentially waiting for his arrival here as he just arrived a few hours ago.

A lot of this is going to focus on defense spending. A lot of it's going to focus on Russia as well. The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy is going to be here for his meeting with the President. It is only their second meeting since that fiery Oval Office meeting that happened a few months ago. And so, that is something everyone's going to be watching closely.

But the fact that the key takeaway here is, you know, going into these summits, they largely decide what they're going to talk about beforehand. Though, obviously, when President Trump is in the room as his own aides will very well and readily concede, things can change and you'll always know what the outcome is going to be.

But the fact that it is tailored to be on defense spending, which is his chief complaint with NATO countries, that they do not spend enough on defense, does show the impact that he has on the conversations that are held at summits like this one. But he was wanting to come into this with the ceasefire brokered between Israel and Iran. That was in part due to his anger that we saw this morning coming out of the White House. And so that is something we'll see how he talks about when he's here meeting with these other world leaders, as he's doing right now.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: And we'll see exactly how he responds to this reporting. Kaitlan Collins, please stand by. Let's go to CNN Global Affairs Analyst, Brett McGurk. And Brett, when you hear this reporting that the Pentagon's intelligence arm has found that these U.S. strikes did not destroy Iran's nuclear capabilities, that Iran's stockpile of enriched uranium was not destroyed, that centrifuges are largely intact. Talk to us about the process of gathering that information, because it's also noted in this reporting that it could change this assessment as more intelligence becomes available. Do you think it's likely something will be found that now contradicts this?

BRETT MCGURK, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Yes, Boris, so I'm just hearing about this as well. Let me kind of tell you the process here. This is pretty early. The DIA is one of about 18 intelligence departments and agencies. I'd be wanting to wait for their assessments will come in from CIA, which has incredible expertise, from the NNSA, the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Agency, from the DNI, which kind of oversees all the intel communities. And then, ultimately, we'll have something called from the NIC, the National Intelligence Council, will do a consensus finding. And that will also include information from Israeli intelligence or partner intelligence or the IAEA.

So, I - it's pretty early here. I think, unfortunately, this intelligence assessment as it's developed is going to be heavily politicized and scrutinized. I think that's unfortunate.

[15:05:07]

Actually, I wrote a piece in cnn.com today that I think emphasized let's let the professionals do their work as they kind of come up with their findings. So, this is a preliminary assessment as is being reported. But this is how the process works. You'll now have assessments from the other departments and agencies with a lot of expertise, looking at different pieces of information. And yet - then, you'll come up with a comprehensive assessment and we'll have to see.

I think I would have a lot of questions just from what I just heard on Fordo. So, obviously, it's unfortunate if the strikes did not do the damage that was aimed for. But is Fordo still accessible? Is it a facility that the Iranians will be able to access and use?

Grossi, the head of the IAEA, Rafael Grossi, he has said his assessment. Again, he hasn't been there, but is that given the level of damage, given how finely calibrated centrifuges are in these cascades of centrifuges in Fordo, it's these 10 cascades of very advanced centrifuges that are the concern. His assessment was very significant damage, probably rendered unusable.

But again, we don't know. I think we have to wait to see this all develop. So, this is a first report. It's been leaked to the media. It's not supposed to happen. When I was on the other side of this, I would probably say that. But this is how this will develop. You'll have DIA, you'll have CIA, you'll have the NNSA, you'll have the DNI overseeing that, and then ultimately, you'll have a NIC assessment and working with partner intelligence agencies, particularly Mossad, who I think has demonstrated just intel dominance inside Iran. I think we'll know what the Iranians are thinking.

So, that's how this process is going to go. Now, if there is a significant nuclear material centrifuge still intact, the big question is what do you do? You have the option to re-attack, that is an option. You also have diplomacy coming up. So, you have - the ultimate aim here is to take care of this with diplomacy.

And one thing Iran knows now that it didn't know a week ago is that these sites can be attacked and they're almost defenseless. That's something Iran always assumed that would never happen. So, a big kind of taboo has been broken.

So, a lot here has to be looked at, Boris and Brianna. I think this is preliminary from the DIA. It's good that they came up with a preliminary assessment to kind of refine what is going to be happening. But that's how this process is going to go. And sometimes it can take days, sometimes it can take weeks. In this case, it might take even more because you'll be collecting a lot of information, particularly inside Iran, as they kind of figure out exactly what went on. So that's my first reaction and kind of just a little bit of context to the process.

KEILAR: Yes, that's really helpful. This is a clearly important snapshot, but there are going to be others. Brett, thank you so much. If you could stand by for us. I do want to go to the region where Erin Burnett is in the UAE. This is obviously some really important breaking news that we're following here, Erin. This early U.S. intelligence assessment from one of the intelligence agencies suggesting that strikes on Iran did not destroy nuclear sites specifically, that it did not destroy Iran's stockpile of enriched uranium. And according to one of these three sources, that the centrifuges are largely still intact.

ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST, "OUTFRONT": Yes. I mean, and you know, obviously you talk about it's one assessment. It could change, others could come out and say something different. But I think in the context of what we have in the moment that we're in, we got to call it like it is, it's a big deal. It's a big deal for them to come out and be willing to say that they think it only set back the Iranian nuclear program by months.

The context, of course, is that the Israelis had said that prior to the U.S. strikes that they had successfully set the Iranian nuclear program back by two to three years. So, you know, unclear whether this month is on top of that or not. I mean, there's a lot of information we don't fully understand. But subsequent to the U.S. bombing of those sites, Fordo specifically, the IDF, the Israeli Defense Forces, had come and bombed some of the access roads to Fordo, which they had said in part were to prevent Iranians from getting in and doing something to try to, you know, ascertain the damage or to be at that site.

So, there are a lot of things we don't know. We also don't know the Israelis' full assessment of how they got to two to three years. But one thing you can also say, while we're talking about the huge significance of this moment, is that in the moment where we're standing now, 24 hours ago, a regional war felt in full swing. The world's largest airport had its airspace closed. People were diving in malls in the Gulf to hide. That that ceasefire happened, it does show, just by actions more than words and any assessment possibly can, that Iran felt that it had no other choice. And that whatever damage had been done or not done, that reality also still stands.

[15:10:03]

Clarissa Ward's in Tel Aviv.

And Clarissa, you know, a lot of things can be true at once, but it is also true that Vice President J.D. Vance had already admitted that in terms of the knowledge as to had Iran moved a lot of its nuclear capacity to other sites and where all the enriched uranium that the U.S. even knew existed had gone if it was moved in advance, they admitted that they didn't know the answers to some of these questions. But even still for this to come out the way it is in these first hours of a fragile ceasefire is very significant.

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It is and it's taking place, this release or this leaking, just as, obviously, President Trump is arriving for that NATO summit, but also just minutes after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu finished an address to the nation in which he basically listed the number of what he called victories against Iran in this sort of 12-day war, as President Trump has called it.

But interesting, the terminology he used, Erin, he described, we have thwarted Iran's nuclear program. The word thwarted clearly somewhat different than totally obliterated, which was what we had heard from President Trump. And as you mentioned, though, we also heard from the IDF just yesterday saying that it had been set back years.

So, it's clear that there is some ambiguity as to the extent of the damage that has been done. But during this address, Prime Minister Netanyahu went on to say that basically if it happens again, if we see Iran restore its nuclear capabilities or its nuclear program or its missile systems, we will strike again with the same degree of force.

So, essentially this was a speech that appeared to be designed to project an image of mission accomplished to the Israeli public. That ceasefire is holding. It got off to a very shaky start, as we've been discussing over the last few hours, but it is now holding. The Israeli Home Front Command has announced that schools will now reopen. The airport is reopening. People can go back to work. Large gatherings can take place again.

And the IDF is also indicating that now the focus, from their perspective, moves back to Gaza, back to releasing the hostages, back to Hamas. One interesting note as well that I thought was worth mentioning, the hostage families forum has actually come out and asked for that ceasefire between Iran and Israel to include Gaza as well, 50 hostages still inside Gaza, 20 of them believed to be alive, and more than 860 Gazans killed during these 12 days of fighting between Israel and Iran.

So, a lot of people now also hoping that there will be some space created for potential negotiations around a ceasefire in Gaza now, Erin.

BURNETT: All right. Clarissa, thank you so much.

And Boris and Brianna, you know, the context around this, we talk about whether this is a tactical moment and pause or more of a total strategic shift. And there's so much we don't know about command and control in Iran right now, but fair to say that, you know, that if this assessment holds, right, that we are in a moment in - what continues to be an ongoing story about Iran's nuclear program. And it gives some context to what Israel said just moments ago, as both of you know, that the significant phase of their campaign is over, but the campaign against Iran is not. And this fits very much within that framing from the Israelis tonight, Boris and Brianna.

SANCHEZ: Very important context. Erin, thank you so much.

Let's get some perspective now from Laura Holgate. She's a former U.S. Ambassador to the IAEA. She also served as the Senior Director for Weapons of Mass Destruction, Terrorism, and Threat Reduction on the National Security Council. Thank you so much for hanging out for a little while and being patient with us.

What do you make of this assessment? It's an initial one. There are something like 18 intelligence agencies that are also going to look at this and assess it, but it is telling, isn't it?

LAURA HOLGATE, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO INTERNATIONAL ATOMIC ENERGY AGENCY: Well, I actually find it not surprising at all. We saw that earlier that the Iranians had told the IAEA Director General, Rafael Grossi, that they were taking steps to secure the highly enriched uranium. We saw overhead of trucks at the facility. Easy to imagine that they might be moving the highly enriched uranium.

So, the fact that there's no evidence - no definitive evidence that it's been destroyed, I find quite like normal. And this is what those who've been skeptical about a military approach to the Iranian nuclear problem have been saying, is it's very, very difficult to obliterate a nuclear program that has spent 20 years and more hiding parts of it from the world.

KEILAR: What about the centrifuge part that - one of the sources, one of these three sources saying that the centrifuges are largely intact.

[15:14:59]

HOLGATE: That one is what seems a little weird to me, because these are very fragile machines and they're spinning at super high rates and you can't actually turn them off or they will, like, rattle and destroy each other. And so, it's not like the - whatever centrifuges they had in the Fordo tunnels and mountain facility had been flipped off and therefore they were stable, they were probably still spinning.

And so, the notion that that kind of a weapon wouldn't shake the mountain, even if it didn't destroy every possible thing inside. I find that a little weird. So, we'll have to wait for - to hear more about that.

SANCHEZ: I asked McGurk - Brett McGurk about sort of the process of coming about this information. We talked about the process of the IAEA just about an hour ago and you were describing that Iran essentially would have to open its doors to the U.N. watchdog to take a look and see what they have. Is that the only avenue that at least internationally would be available to sort of verify this information?

HOLGATE: Well, it all depends on how much access any inspector would receive. The - Iran is legally obligated to get that material back under safeguards to show the agency inspectors where the material is, what other facilities may still exist and so on. So that is not a question of whether they're legally obligated. The question is, will they live up to that obligation, which is where some of the compliance issues have been coming in recent years.

The - it's possible that other entities could get there on the ground, but it's not going to be without the Iranians' express permission. I mean, I can't imagine that a covert kind of operation could get - have the amount of time on the ground, would have the amount of access to places that may not be these places. I fully expect that this highly enriched uranium is somewhere else and nobody knows, except the Iranians, where that is. They haven't told the IAEA they're legally obliged to do so. And as - I hope they would once they have a sense that the hostility phase of whatever this is, is over, but that's still to be seen.

KEILAR: How unusual is it to get competing assessments, right? If you have different assessments from different parts of the intelligence community within the US, then from partner countries that have different intelligence, some may have assets on the ground. Obviously, they're going to have better intelligence. How often is it to get sort of seeing bits of the elephant and putting it together, or even getting competing pictures?

HOLGATE: It's not unusual to have competing perspectives because each of these agencies is expert in different types of sources and methods. Some use overhead, some use human intelligence, some use electronic intelligence, all of the sources of intelligence that we have available to us, and partner intelligence is part of that.

And so, the - that's why we have an intelligence community is that we pull all these things together, and then there's a perspective, they argue it out when there's a difference, they come to an understanding about what everybody can be on board with, or if there's something that an agency says, well, I really, really think this is true, and no one else trusts them, they can do a dissent. Or no one else agrees with them, I shouldn't say trust.

Then - so, there's - we have a process for wringing out these differences based on different sources of knowledge, different analytical techniques, and to talk it through. And this is coming out before that process has taken place. It's not surprising, therefore, that it's a little bit fragmentary. And I think it's reasonable to expect that it may change.

KEILAR: And just before we let you go, the assessment that we have heard from Trump administration officials, which is that this has been a successful military operation, and it may have been. I mean, if they're hitting their target - these are their targets, the ventilation shaft, this piece, that piece, and they're hitting it. And they're sort of just trying to deduce that if you hit your targets, then you are succeeding and you are destroying things. Can they actually extrapolate that or is that just maybe an argument to be made to say that it is what they hope it is, which is a success?

HOLGATE: Well, I don't think any of this information suggests that there was anything wrong with the specifics of how the attack was carried out or how the weapons performed. The point is, using weapons to destroy this kind of a program is a very, very challenging thing, and most people have felt it would not be successful. So, for this little first tidbit to come out successful in actually destroying, as opposed to setting back or disrupting the program, that this little tidbit is coming out and saying, oh, it wasn't a hundred percent destroyed or obliterated, I think that's what we would expect to see.

KEILAR: Super helpful to get your perspective.

Laura Holgate, thank you so much for being with us.

HOLGATE: Great to be with you.

KEILAR: And we do have much more on our breaking news right after a quick break. Stay with CNN for that.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:24:07]

KEILAR: Back to our breaking news now. Sources telling CNN that according to an early U.S. intelligence assessment, the U.S. military strikes on three of Iran's nuclear facilities last weekend did not destroy the core components of the country's nuclear program.

SANCHEZ: Well, let's get back to CNN National Security Correspondent, Natasha Bertrand, for the exclusive reporting. Natasha, what more are you learning?

NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Boris, so this is an early assessment from the Defense Intelligence Agency, which is the Pentagon's intelligence arm. And we do want to emphasize that the intelligence, of course, is ongoing. The collection is ongoing and the assessments as a result of that intelligence could change. But as of right now, the DIA has produced this intelligence assessment that we are told was based on the battle damage assessment that U.S. Central Command has done following those massive bombings and strikes that the U.S. carried out inside Iran last weekend.

[15:24:59]

And what we are told is that based on the assessments of the damage that these bombs implemented on these nuclear sites, that as of right now, it does not appear that they ended or obliterated Iran's nuclear program. Instead, they only set it back by months, according to people who were briefed on the assessment.

Now, these findings are obviously at odds with President Donald Trump's repeated assertions that the strikes, quote, completely and totally obliterated Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities, something that has been echoed as well by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. But we did ask the White House for comments on this, and they appeared to acknowledge the existence of the assessment, but they said that they disagreed with it.

According to White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, she said, quote, "This alleged assessment is flat-out wrong. She said it was classified as top secret, but was still leaked to CNN by an anonymous low-level loser in the intelligence community. The leaking of this alleged assessment is a clear attempt to demean President Trump and discredit the brave fighter pilots who conducted a perfectly executed mission to obliterate Iran's nuclear program. Everyone knows what happens when you drop 14 30,000-pound bombs perfectly on their targets: total obliteration."

Now, it's worth noting that there has been some disagreement within the intelligence community and the defense community about just what kind of impact these massive bunker-busting 30,000-pound bombs would actually have on Iranian nuclear facilities, because they have never been used in combat before. They have been tested extensively, but when it comes to actually dropping them on Iranian nuclear facilities, many of which are very deeply buried underground, the impact of those bombs has been unclear.

And so, it appears that while these bombs did, in fact, inflict significant damage on the above-ground structures at these nuclear facilities, the most sensitive and core parts of the nuclear program, which include the centrifuges, which include the highly enriched uranium, those do not appear to have been severely impacted, if impacted at all, with one of our sources who has seen the assessment describing all of those core components as largely intact.

And so, this is obviously going to raise new questions about, you know, why President Trump and the administration have been saying repeatedly that Iran's nuclear program has essentially been ended, that it has been completely obliterated. But we should also note that Secretary of Defense Hegseth did give us a statement as well, and he said that based on everything we have seen, and I've seen it all, our bombing campaign obliterated Iran's ability to create nuclear weapons. Our massive bombs hit exactly the right spot at each target and worked perfectly.

The impact of those bombs is buried under a mountain of rubble in Iran, so anyone who says the bombs were not devastating is just trying to undermine the President and the successful mission. Now, it is worth emphasizing again that while the damage, we are told, according to this DIA assessment, was largely limited to the above ground structures, those above ground structures are not insignificant. They include site's power infrastructure, they include some of those facilities that are used to actually turn uranium into metal for bomb making.

But again, this very early assessment suggests that the military strikes that were carried out on Saturday may not have gone as far as President Trump has suggested they have. Boris, Brianna.

SANCHEZ: Natasha, please stand by. Let's bring in retired general and former NATO Supreme Allied Commander, Wesley Clark. Also, Jon Wolfsthal. He's the former special assistant to President Obama for National Security. Thank you both for being with us.

General, your reaction to this news and what you're hearing from the White House arguing that this preliminary report is wrong.

GEN. WESLEY CLARK, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, I think that most of us didn't believe that you could completely obliterate a nuclear program by bombing. And the Air Force did a magnificent job. This is not to take anything away from the U.S. Central Command, the tremendous planning, coordination, and all that they get. The information I've seen at the unclass level is there's no collapse of the mountain, which could have happened. There's no radiation leakage. There's no thermal indications inside the mountain. But look, we shouldn't be surprised by this. First of all, it could

have gone through and obliterated the centrifuges, but we've been talking on TV about Fordo for days. I mean, the Iranians aren't stupid. They've heard what we're talking about. They certainly, if they hadn't done it before, would have pulled out the sensitive material if they could have gotten it out. And they've had years to develop secret places, underground places. We can't believe they tell everything to the IAE. We've caught them in lies in the past with the IAEA.

So, you know, what it says to me is that there's a lot more work to be done. Israel's actions, the United States joining in as one of a series, really going back to the War of Independence of 1948.

[15:30:05]