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U.S. Strikes on Iran Did Not Destroy Nuclear Facilities; Strikes Set Back Iran's Nuclear Program by Months; Israel-Iran Ceasefire Holding; New Assessment on U.S. Strikes on Iran; Iran Suspends IAEA Cooperation; Rutte and Trump Speak at NATO Summit. Aired 4-4:30a ET
Aired June 25, 2025 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[04:00:00]
ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.
BECKY ANDERSON, CNN HOST: Well, hello and welcome to our viewers joining us in the United States and around the world, wherever you are watching, you are more than welcome. I'm Becky Anderson, live from our Middle East programming headquarters here in Abu Dhabi.
Well, we begin with new reporting on how much damage U.S. airstrikes did or did not do to Iran's nuclear program. CNN has learned that a preliminary assessment by the Defense Intelligence Agency suggests it may be far less than the president and others said it was immediately after the attack. Our sources say Iran's nuclear program has only been set back by a few months, and Iran's stockpile of Enrich uranium was not destroyed, but moved out of the sites prior to the U.S. strikes.
Well, President Trump claims CNN and The New York Times are trying to demean at these successful military strikes, which he says completely destroyed the Iranian nuclear facilities and that echoes what he and his administration has been saying all week.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, U.S. PRESIDENT: Iran's key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated.
PETE HEGSETH, U.S. DEFENSE SECRETARY: Iran's nuclear ambitions have been obliterated.
J. D. VANCE, U.S. VICE PRESIDENT: We have destroyed the Iranian nuclear program.
KAROLINE LEAVITT, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: We are confident, yes, that Iran's nuclear sites were completely and totally obliterated.
TRUMP: Iran will never rebuild its nuclear. From there? Absolutely not. That place is under rock. That place is demolished.
Couldn't destroyed it. Everyone hit.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON: Well, more now from CNN's Natasha Bertrand.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: The U.S. military strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities over the weekend did not destroy the core components of Iran's nuclear program and likely only set the program back by a few months, that's according to a very early intelligence assessment that was produced by the Defense Intelligence Agency, and it was based off of a battle damage assessment conducted by U.S. Central Command.
Now, it's important to note that this is only one intelligence agency's assessment out of about 17 in the broader Intelligence Community. And it is not clear at this point just how the other Intel agencies, including the CIA, have assessed the impact of the U.S. military strikes. But it is worth noting that according to this DIA assessment, which was described to CNN by over half a dozen sources familiar with it, the core underground, parts of these three key nuclear facilities were not damaged enough to significantly set back Iran's nuclear program.
And in fact, the enriched uranium that Iran had been storing at these sites was moved, according to several sources familiar with the intelligence on the matter. In addition, it appears that the centrifuges at several of these facilities remain largely intact.
And so, this would appear to contradict President Trump's repeated assertions that the nuclear sites were, quote, "obliterated" by the U.S. military strikes last weekend. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth also gave a very early assessment over the weekend of the success of the U.S. strikes, saying that they had essentially obliterated Iran's nuclear ambitions writ large.
Now, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who is the top general in the U.S. government and President Trump's top military adviser, he was much more measured early on and he said that it's still too early to say for sure how much these U.S. military strikes actually degraded Iran's nuclear program.
And so, now we are starting to see, you know, the very first assessment come out of the Intel community about just how much this program may have set back Iran's nuclear program. And it appears, according to this early assessment, that it's only by a few months. In fact, the Israeli assessment coming out of these strikes is similar. They assess that the impact was less than they had hoped.
And so, it remains to be seen moving forward what the other Intel agencies are going to be saying, because there's still a lot of intelligence to be collected about these strikes. And of course, much more to be assessed about the actual damage.
But for now, the White House pushing back very strongly against this specific DIA report, saying that they can consider it to be flat out wrong. Natasha Bertrand, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANDERSON: Well, Darya Dolzikova is a senior research fellow for proliferation and nuclear policy at the Royal United Services Institute, and she joins me now live from London. Darya, what do you make of this reporting?
DARYA DOLZIKOVA, SENIOR FELLOW, ROYAL UNITED SERVICES INSTITUTE AND SENIOR RESEARCH FELLOW, PROLIFERATION AND NUCLEAR POLICY: Well, I think as the earlier presenter said it's still a very preliminary. So, we still, unfortunately, don't have a full picture of the extent of the damage. But it is an interesting and a helpful indicator on where at least one of the intelligence agencies sits. So, it gives us a little bit more of an idea of what might have happened.
[04:05:00]
And frankly, the report is accurate. And DIA is tasked with providing intelligence to the defense establishment. So, I'm inclined, if the report is accurate, the reporting is accurate, to believe the DIA assessment. If it is correct, then it wouldn't be particularly surprising. Lots of analysts were saying well before the military strikes and including after the military strikes as well, the program can't be, quote/unquote, "obliterated" at this point. You can set it back to varying degrees. You know, if we're talking about a setback of a few months using these strikes. That's not a very significant degree to set the program back by. So, the assessment isn't particularly surprising if it is accurate.
ANDERSON: Right. What timeline do you expect to have some concrete assessment then on what is left of the program?
DOLZIKOVA: Well, I think we'll have to wait with what the other intelligence agencies come back with and choose to release to the public. Again, the more sources we have, the better really. The International Atomic Energy Agency doesn't seem to have access to that facility. Ideally, you'd want to have IAEA on the ground and visibility of the site and any kind of damage that might have been sustained. But considering the situation, that'll be very hard for them to ascertain as well.
ANDERSON: If preventing Iran from building a bomb then was the goal, then what's been achieved to your mind at this point?
DOLZIKOVA: I mean, I would struggle to call this, at this point, a strategic success on the nonproliferation side. I mean, you know, if we look, let's say, at the most generous assessment of how far the program has been set back with both U.S. strikes and Israeli strikes, because we have to keep in mind before the U.S. strikes were carried out, Israel had attacked a number of Iranian facilities as well. So, that will cause significant damage as well.
I think the assessments that I read from reporting of basically the Israeli assessment is that the program has been set back by perhaps a couple of years. Fine. But that's still a program that the Iranians can reconstitute eventually. And on top of that, not only have we set the program back, have these strikes set the program back to a limited degree, you've probably emboldened the Iranians to not only reconstitute and reconstitute as quickly as they can, but also to do it in a way that is not transparent, and that makes further attacks more difficult and further verification and monitoring on the program and some kind of transparency moving forward a lot harder.
ANDERSON: This enriched uranium, which reports suggest was moved from Fordow before these strikes, what do you make of that? Where might it have been moved to? And I know this is the realm of speculation, but I'm just trying to nail how significant a move that would've been, of course. If it was moved, where might it have been moved to and how does it, you know, play into, you know, the sense that Iran is effectively still equipped?
DOLZIKOVA: Sure. So, as you say, it's -- it would be a bit speculative to try to figure out where that material might be now if it was moved. And the -- my understanding is that the bulk of the material wouldn't have been kept at Fordow anyways. I mean, there will be a lot of (INAUDIBLE) hexafluoride, some a bit enriched to 60 percent, which is what we're particularly concerned about at Fordow, because that's where the enrichment happened.
But my understanding, again, is that's not where the stockpiles of the material were kept. You know, I've seen reporting that they were kept at the at the Isfahan complex, which, again, was also targeted with the extent of the damage and whether that material was still there is unclear. It's like we've been moved elsewhere.
I mean, the material is -- it is movable. It's a lot of material. So, it would take quite a bit to move it, but it is technically movable. It would also be quite difficult to move it undetected in a country that is now under extreme scrutiny and to move it safely, of course, because this country has now essentially become a war zone after these strikes.
I mean, the other thing to keep in mind as well, it's not just the material, but also what's happened to some of the advanced centrifuges that Iran was producing that hadn't been installed yet. So, if you combine those two things, the advanced centrifuges that Iran was producing with potentially this enrich uranium that was salvaged before the strikes, you know, there's no reason why Iran couldn't reconstitute, you know, several cascades and continue enriching potentially in a secret facility, in a deeply buried facility somewhere.
[04:10:00]
ANDERSON: Darya, good to have you. Thank you very much indeed. Well, the truce between Israel and Iran does appear to be holding, though it does remain fragile. Of course, both Israel and Iran claiming victory. Israel's ambassador to the United Nations says his country will respond forcefully to any ceasefire violation, and Iran's president says they will not violate the terms of the ceasefire unless Israel breaks the pact. First, let's bring in CNN's Salma Abdelaziz. She's following the very latest developments live from London. That of course, begs the question, what are the terms of the deal, say the stopping of these strikes at this point, Salma?
SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Becky, I think very few details have been given to the public about the details of this, and President Trump has been quick essentially to push back on both these countries, on both Israel and Iran if he sensed any hesitation towards that truce.
Yes, of course, it does appear to be holding, but that's after in the hours following the ceasefire, both sides traded accusations of violating the truce, prompting President Trump to step out, use a bad language essentially in order to describe the conflict, telling them to get in line and sort of telling them off like children in this conflict since that time. Again, the ceasefire has appeared to hold, but the question is how do you sustain the peace, especially when you're looking at these intelligence assessments, which you've just gone through, which indicate that potentially the damage done to Iran's nuclear facilities is nowhere near the level that President Trump and his administration had sought.
They, of course, have described this as a total victory and have said that any pushback against that assessment is essentially an insult to President Trump and the U.S. military. But what you've also heard there is that there needs to be further verification in monitoring of Iran's nuclear program. Iran, for its part, has brushed aside any claims of victory and says that it has been able to maintain its nuclear program on some level.
Look, the important thing to remember here is that in the days leading up to this conflict, President Trump was actually pursuing a diplomatic solution, and most weapons experts will tell you it would be very difficult to essentially bomb a nuclear program out of existence. It does require some level of diplomacy in order for that monitoring and verification of Iran's nuclear program to continue.
Are the parties open to that diplomacy? Well, for Iran's part, Iran's president just yesterday expressing that he is willing to engage with the United States. President Trump has as well seemed to open that possibility of diplomacy. So, in the end, we may end up back where we started, Becky, at the negotiating table.
ANDERSON: Yes. It's good to have you. Thank you. That insight is important, Salma. And just in to CNN, Iran's parliament has voted to suspend cooperation with the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the IAEA. This doesn't necessarily mean that it will happen, of course. The decision by Iran's Islamic consultative assembly known as the Majles will now be -- need to be ratified by the Supreme National Security Council that is chaired by the Iranian presidents.
Well, Iran's U.N. envoy thanked Qatar for its role in mediating the ceasefire. We'll get the more perspective from Qatar when I speak with a foreign ministry spokesperson in the next hour. It's the first interview with the Qatari Foreign Ministry since a U.S. base in the country was targeted by Iranian missiles on Monday.
And still to come, what the White House is saying about early intelligence on the U.S. strikes on Iran's nuclear sites. Our breaking news coverage continues in a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[04:15:00]
ANDERSON: Welcome back. You're watching CNN with me, Becky Anderson. Back to our top story this hour. An early assessment by the Pentagon's intelligence arm finds that the U.S. strikes did not damage Iran's nuclear facilities as extensively as previously believed. The assessment may still change as more information, of course, is gathered. But sources tell CNN the strikes lightly set Iran back by only months.
The White House pushing back with the Trump administration sticking to the president's claims that the strikes completely and totally obliterated Iran's nuclear enrichment facilities. Here's Vice President, J. D. Vance.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VANCE: For 60 days, he negotiated aggressively to encourage that Iranian regime to give up those weapons peacefully. And by the way, he was more than willing to accept a peaceful settlement to that problem. But again, this comes back to instincts. When the president realized that there was not going to be a peaceful settlement to that problem, he sent B-2 bombers and dropped 12 30,000-pound bombs on the worst facility and destroyed that program.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANDERSON: Just in to CNN, Iran's parliament has just voted to suspend cooperation with the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the IAEA. This doesn't necessarily mean that it will happen. The ultimate decision lies with the Supreme National Security Council, but that would be a very big move should it happen.
[04:20:00]
Joining us now from London is Maha Yahya, who's the director of the Carnegie Middle East Center. What do you make of what I've just reported there?
MAHA YAHYA, DIRECTOR, CARNEGIE MIDDLE EAST CENTER: Good morning, Becky. Look, they need to do something. They have to indicate their displeasure. This -- I mean, the bombing at the U.S. space in Qatar was very well orchestrated. Let's put it this way. So, we're going to see some of these actions, which indicate their displeasure at what happened. The sense that -- and they need to show a kind of a strong front. I'm talking about the Iranian regime obviously. A strong front internally, because now is a moment where they do need to turn inwards and regather and rebuild support within Iran itself for the regime as it is. ANDERSON: Although, not a stated goal --
YAHYA: Now, whether this --
ANDERSON: -- become pretty clear that Donald -- that Benjamin Netanyahu had been looking for regime change, when asked yesterday, Donald Trump said very specifically, that is not what the U.S. seeks at this point. What do you understand to be the state of the regime, sort of infrastructure personnel at this point? And what do you expect to see next?
YAHYA: It is very difficult to tell at this point. And I think it can go in any direction. These things take time and they take time to unravel. What we're already seeing and we already started seeing it during the conflict, broad -- you know, people were being executed on the accusation of being spies for Israel. The level of infiltration, I think, Israeli infiltration within not only the security services, but broadly speaking, was quite shocking for the Iranians, though I found that a bit surprising given how Hezbollah also was infiltrated in Lebanon. So, it was quite a blow, a significant blow. I don't think they imagined they were that infiltrated.
So, now, there's going to be a clamp down, an attempt to build up this rally around the flag. But it's really unclear in which direction things will go, and I think it'll take time for us to see. The regime will definitely have to change. We just don't know in what direction. It doesn't mean a change -- to be clear, I don't mean a regime change in terms of out with the old and with the new, but the nature of the regime itself is going to change and the way it governs Iran.
Already, it was suffering from a legitimacy crisis before within various sectors of the Iranian population. It has a lot of internal issues, socioeconomic discontent and, you know, growing inequality. Infrastructure now damage, reconstruction. Who's going to rebuild the thousands of housing units that have been destroyed.
ANDERSON: And, Maha, I'm going to stop you there because we are just seeing Donald Trump and the NATO secretary general speaking in The Hague. Let me just jump in.
TRUMP: They're going up to 5 percent and that's a big -- from 2 percent. And a lot of people didn't even pay the 2 percent. So, I think that's going to be very big news. NATO's going to become very strong with us. And I appreciate doing it. Perhaps you want to talk?
MARK RUTTE, NATO SECRETARY GENERAL: Yes, absolutely. First, before I go spending, I just want to recognize your decisive action on Iran.
TRUMP: Thank you.
RUTTE: You are a man of strength, but you're also a man of peace. And the fact that you are now also successful in getting this ceasefire down between Israel and Iran, I really want to commend you for it.
TRUMP: Thank you very much. RUTTE: And I think this is important for the whole world. Then on spending, it's absolutely true. I want to state here, without President Trump this would not have had it, in three stages. When you president in 2016, 2017, you forced Europeans, the Canadians to pay more. At this moment, result of that phase is 1 trillion extra, agricultural defense spending by the Canadians and the Europeans.
Then came phase two, when you became president, January last year. Phase two is that all the countries not yet on 2 percent have now committed to the 2 percent. This is the old goal from wheels in 2014. Seven were not on 2 percent. Some were saying somewhere in the 2030s. Now, this year, all of them, including Canada, including Italy, including Belgium, they have all now committed to the 2 percent.
And now, comes the big splash. Today, we all decided to go to 5 percent. We have to keep ourselves safe for our adversaries, but also because it is fair to equalize with the United States. With this 5 percent, the Europeans and the Canadians will equalize their defense spending with the United States.
[04:25:00]
So, this is not about American taxpayers paying more, this is about Europeans, Canadians paying more. And again, this would not have happened -- I'm really saying this here, and some people might criticize me, but then when I speak with them, they all say, yes, you are right, this would not have happened if you would not have been elected in 2016 and reelected last year and back into office in January. So, I want to thank you.
TRUMP: Well, thank you very much. It's a great victory for everybody, I think. And we will be equalized very shortly and that's the way it has to be. It's going to be a lot of money too. A lot of defense.
RUTTE: Trillions of stuff.
TRUMP: Yes. And we have a great relationship and we've had a great relationship from the beginning. Highly respected man. And yes, we appreciate you being here too, everybody. We really do. We have a tremendous group of people on my left and a tremendous group of people on my right. They might be even better than my people. I know. Let's have a fight. Let's figure it out.
Anyway, but we appreciate it. And we've had a tremendous relationship, Mark and I.
RUTTE: Absolutely.
TRUMP: And we've really worked on this subject for a long time. When Biden was here and just died, just died like everything else died. And now, it's -- you're going to take, I guess, a vote today, right?
RUTTE: Absolutely. Today, we will decide unanimously to do this. That's my absolute conviction.
TRUMP: So, we can't we can't talk about it until the vote's taken, because sometimes, you know, strange things happens with it. But I think you're going to get --
RUTTE: I'm not too worried. I'm not too worried.
TRUMP: I think you're going to do very well. Everyone's very happy about it. Go ahead. Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, how is the Iran-Israel ceasefire going in your opinion?
TRUMP: I think very good. I think very good. Israel came back yesterday. I was so proud of them because they came back. You know, they went out because they felt it was a violation. And technically, they were right, but it just wouldn't have worked out very well. And they brought the planes back. They had gone on to another journey because there was a little bit of a violation. And I said, you got to get them back. And they came back and it was a great thing. And it is going very well.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, what is your response to the foreign minister saying they still want to enrich nuclear?
TRUMP: Hello, Katie (ph). She's so great. This one. Any question she has, I'll answer. Well, maybe I better not say that. What was your question?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What is your response to the Iranian foreign minister continuing to say Iran will enrich uranium and pursuit of nuclear weapons?
TRUMP: Well, I don't know if they've said that, but I'll tell you the last thing they want to do is enrich anything right now. They want to recover. And we won't let that happen, number one. Militarily, we won't. I think we'll end up having somewhat of a relationship with Iran. I see it.
Look, I've had a relationship over the last four days. They agreed to ceasefire and it was a very equal agreement. They both said, that's enough. They both said it. But no, they won't do that. The last thing they want to do, Katie (ph), is enrich. They're not looking to -- they're not -- can you imagine after all of that, they're going to say, oh, let's go and do a bomb.
You know, there could be a day in the future. And then, somebody else taking our place will be saying, don't do it. And maybe they won't do it as well, I don't know. But they're not going to have a bomb and they're not going to enrich. And we believe all of the stuff is down there, we don't think they had nearly the time. Because to get that out is a very difficult thing. It's not like moving a package or taking this carpet up and moving it. It's very difficult. It's very dangerous to do. We believe it's all down there.
We had a tremendous victory, a tremendous hit. And because of that, they -- I don't think they would've been down there because they knew we were coming. When they know we're coming, they're not going to be down in that, you know, 30 stories underground. So, no, I think it was just a tremendous victory for everybody, including Iran. Look, you know, they've got a country and they've got oil and they're very smart people and they can come back. Israel got hit very hard, especially the last couple of days. Israel was hit really hard, those ballistic missiles. Boy, they took out a lot of buildings. And they've been great. Bibi Netanyahu should be very proud of himself and they've really been great. But they're not going to be building bombs for a long time.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, what's your reaction to the intelligence reports saying that the Iranian nuclear sites were only partially devastated, not entirely --
TRUMP: Yes. Well, it, they said it was -- actually, the report said it could have been very -- they don't know. I mean, they did a report. I could have Pete talk to it because his department did the report. They really don't know. I think Israel's going to be telling us very soon because Bibi is going to have people involved in that whole situation.
We hear it was obliteration. It was a virtual obliteration. When you take a look at the ground above -- don't forget, the flame is all underground, but everything above, if you look at the before and the after picture, everything above is burned black, the trees, everything. There's one building, but that's a building that sunk substantially into the granite. So that, you know, the fire goes right over it.
[04:30:00]