A bombshell revelation has emerged from Washington, directly challenging the Trump administration's core justification for going to war with Iran. Director of US National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee on March 18, stating that the US intelligence community had assessed that Iran was not rebuilding its nuclear enrichment capabilities following US and Israeli attacks in June 2025.
In her written testimony, Gabbard stated that as a result of Operation Midnight Hammer, Iran's nuclear enrichment program was obliterated and that the entrances to the underground facilities that were bombed had been buried and sealed with cement. She confirmed there had been no efforts since then to rebuild their enrichment capability. However, she chose not to read that section aloud during her publicly televised hearing.
When pressed by Democratic Senator Mark Warner on why she had omitted the passage, Gabbard said she recognised that time was running long. Warner suggested she chose to omit the parts that contradict the president. Trump had told congressional leaders on March 4 that Iran was two weeks away from acquiring a nuclear weapon, a claim that Gabbard's own written assessment appeared to directly contradict.
Gabbard separately assessed that Iran's regime remains intact but largely degraded following weeks of strikes, including the killing of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. She warned that if a hostile regime survives, it will likely seek to begin a years-long effort to rebuild its military, missile, and drone forces.
The testimony came a day after Gabbard's top deputy, Joe Kent, Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, resigned in protest over the Iran war, stating in his resignation letter that Tehran posed no imminent threat to the United States. The growing gap between White House statements and intelligence community assessments has intensified congressional scrutiny over how and why the war began.
