>Given that the US failed to seize Iran's uranium stockpile

I did not think this was possible. The three sites that were bombed in 2025 are all pretty centrally located within the country. Even if you can get troops there, the facilities are hardened and at least partially underground. Depending on how effective you believe the 2025 strikes to be, some of the facilities may be collapsed under tons of rock. There is no way to smash-and-grab the already enriched uranium.

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adrian_b 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

It seems that there was a failed US incursion towards Isfahan, where much of the enriched uranium is buried, a week ago.

They could not reach their target and they had to scuttle and abandon two MC-130J airplanes and a helicopter, apparently because they were too damaged by the air defense to fly back.

The official version is that the purpose of the failed incursion was to save the crew of the previously shot down F-15E.

However, the use of a greatly disproportionate amount of people and aircraft for a supposed search and rescue mission has lead to the speculation that the true goal of the failed incursion was the extraction of the uranium and that the downed F-15E had participated to the preparation of this mission.

It is estimated that the cost of this operation has been around a half of billion dollars.

While the 2 men from the F-15E were saved successfully, it seems that this should have been easy to achieve at a cost much less than a couple hundred million dollars per head, which makes believable the hypothesis that most of the operation was unrelated to saving people, but it intended to reach the uranium deposits.

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3eb7988a1663 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

Public information on Isfahan says the entrances to the underground areas is still caved in from the prior bombings. Unless the Iranians have already dug out the tunnels, the soldiers would have to land in enemy territory with their own heavy equipment. Then attempt to excavate the area while open to counterattack.

If it were so easy that commandos could drop in and dig out the site in a day - seems improbable that the Iranians would not have already done the same. If the Iranians had already excavated the tunnels, it would seem prudent to immediately move the uranium to another location.

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Gud 2 days ago | parent [-]

Why would that be prudent? Seems to me the underground fortress is working well.

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3eb7988a1663 2 days ago | parent [-]

A defensible fortress is nice, but even better if the enemy does not know where you hide the goods. Supposedly there is <1000 pounds of the good stuff, you could move that anywhere. Without any immediate plans to use the uranium, securing it for the future strikes me as the sound choice.

	▲	Gud 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		You’re right that they should spread it out over many locations.

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a day ago | parent | prev [-]

[deleted]

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recursivecaveat 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Yeah they buried almost 1000 tons of it under rubble last year. Good luck digging that up easily. Some analyist suggests that 1000+ troops per location would be required: https://apnews.com/article/trump-iran-enriched-uranium-nucle...