Mulling over US options, President Donald Trump has said that it will give Iran a two-week window to open negotiations before considering direct US military intervention in the conflict, reports CNN.
White House officials have expressed hope that Trump’s hardline stance, coupled with Israel’s relentless strikes against Iranian missile infrastructure – which Tel Aviv says has decimated two-thirds of Tehran’s missile launching capabilities – will open windows for negotiations, and allow both countries to come to a deal.
For its part, Iran has refused to budge an inch, with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khomeini warning of serious repercussions for the US, if it intervenes militarily.
In a statement read out by the White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that there was a “substantial chance of negotiations” with Iran, though did not confirm anything.
Meanwhile, CBS News has reported that while Trump has approved plans to attack Iran, and has been diverting military supplies to American bases in the Middle East, he has still not decided whether or not to go through with military attacks.
He is reportedly weighing an attack on Iran’s underground uranium enrichment facility at Fordo, and is one of the most difficult areas to strike.
The Fordo complex is built deep within northern Iran’s rugged, remote mountains and is designed to withstand air strikes, with its underground location shielding it from conventional bombs.
Despite the Israeli military’s capabilities, the Fordo complex presents a very unique challenge for the IDF, because of the sheer depth of its underground facilities.
To cause any meaningful damage to the site it would need to be targeted by a “bunker buster” munition that is able to penetrate deep below the surface. While Israel possesses the resources to destroy underground bunkers, it does not have the bombing capabilities required to destroy a complex like the Ford plant.
However, the US is believed to have a bomb which might do the trick – the GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP) – which can strike 61m deep. But even that may prove insufficient to destroy the Ford, as the tunnels go 80-90m below the surface.
