The U.S. carried out a series of military strikes on Iran, President Donald Trump announced on social media on Saturday.
U.S. aircraft struck three nuclear sites in Iran: Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan, Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social.
“All planes are now outside of Iran air space. A full payload of BOMBS was dropped on the primary site, Fordow,” Trump wrote. “All planes are safely on their way home.”
Speaking to the public in a televised address Saturday evening, Trump called the operation a “spectacular military success.”
“Iran’s key nuclear enrichment facilities have been completely and totally obliterated,” Trump said. “Iran, the bully of the Middle East, must now make peace.”
The sudden bombing comes after more than a week of fighting between Israel and Iran, which started with Israeli forces targeting key military and scientific figures tied to Iran’s nuclear program. The United States had been negotiating with Iran over its nuclear enrichment program prior to Israel’s attack on the country. The U.S. intelligence community said in March that Iran was not pursuing a nuclear weapon.
Trump did not outline a legal case for the actions in his statements, including an imminent threat to U.S. personnel.
Little detail was immediately available on what platforms or weapon systems were involved in the strikes. Trump did remark that no military in the world could have done what the United States did, suggesting the involvement of American B-2 stealth bombers. Task & Purpose contacted the White House, the Department of Defense, and U.S. Central Command for additional information; the Pentagon and CENTCOM referred Task & Purpose to the White House, which has not responded.
The New York Times, citing an American official, reports that 30 Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles were used in the strikes on Natanz and Isfahan. Meanwhile, the same official said that six B-2 bombers dropped 12 bunker buster bombs at Fordow.
In the aftermath of the strikes, Trump said that “there will be either peace or tragedy for Iran far greater than we have witnessed over the last eight days.” He did not outline what would count to the United States as a benchmark for peace or what Iran would need to do in the aftermath of the airstrikes to build towards it.
“Remember there are many targets left,” he continued. “Tonight’s was the most difficult of them all, by far, and perhaps the most lethal, but if peace does not come quickly we will go after those other targets with precision, speed, and skill. Most of them can be taken out in a matter of minutes.”
The Untied States currently has roughly 40,000 troops inside the CENTCOM area of responsibility, which includes most of the Middle East, Central Asia and Egypt (Turkey, despite a heavy U.S. presence, is not a part of CENTCOM).
After the airstrikes, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s Supreme Leader, reshared a previous message he had posted to social media, warning that if the United States entered the war “[t]he damage it will suffer will be far greater than any harm Iran will encounter.” Iranian state media also said that there was no radioactive material at the three locations hit by the United States.
The United States has generally had approximately 30,000 troops in the region, although that swelled to more than 40,000 after the outbreak of the Israeli war in Gaza, which started in October 2023. Over the last 20 months, U.S. forces have surged, with multiple carrier strike groups, additional fighter squadrons, and more ground-based assets coming into the Middle East. Two Terminal High Altitude Area Defense or THAAD systems, one of the Army’s most powerful and advanced missile defense systems, were moved to Israel. Multiple MIM-104 Patriot surface-to-air missile batteries are in the area, with two inside Iraq.
The USS Carl Vinson and its carrier support group, which includes two destroyers and a carrier air wing, are in the Arabian Sea. The USS Nimitz and its strike group is currently en route to the region. Three additional independently sailing destroyers are active in the eastern Mediterranean Sea.
Since the outbreak of the war in Gaza, U.S. forces in multiple countries in the region have been targeted by pro-Iran or anti-American militias. American forces also engaged in a year and a half combat with Houthi militants inside Yemen, with a second loose ceasefire reached in May.
Outside of the Central Command’s area of responsibility, U.S. forces also maintain bombers and other aircraft at their Indian Ocean base on the island of Diego Garcia. That strategic outpost — jointly operated with the United Kingdom — is a staging base for B-2 bombers. B-2s were briefly sent over earlier in the spring as Operation Rough Rider against Houthi forces was underway. U.S. officials have not specifically said that B-2s were involved in the attack on Iran, but only the B-2 can carry the GBU-57 bunker buster bombs, deemed need for any potential strike on Fordow, given its location deep underground.
Update: 6/21/2025; This story was updated after publication with additional information regarding U.S. forces in the region; details from reporting on the strike; and with President Donald Trump’s remarks.
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