President Donald Trump is threatening to strike Iran’s deeply buried Pickaxe Mountain nuclear facility — a site the United States previously left untouched while bombing the country’s other major nuclear sites, raising new questions about what may have changed.Estimated to lie beneath at least 100 meters of rock near Iran's damaged Natanz nuclear enrichment complex, Pickaxe was designed to replace an above-ground plant capable of assembling roughly 6,000 advanced centrifuges each year before it was destroyed in 2020.Iran said the replacement would be larger, more modern and built "in the heart of the mountain." Analysts believe the tunnels could eventually hold a centrifuge assembly line, an enrichment plant or equipment used in certain nuclear weaponization activities.Satellite image Pickaxe Mountain (Vantor/Handout via Reuters)I'VE STUDIED MILITARY STRATEGY.TRUMP NOW FACES IRAN'S OLDEST BATTLEFIELD TRICKYet the administration has not said whether it has confirmed that centrifuges were moved inside — or why a site left untouched during earlier attacks now warrants a strike.
Military experts also disagree over whether airstrikes could destroy Pickaxe’s interior or merely seal its entrances temporarily.The same depth that could protect Iran’s nuclear infrastructure may place Pickaxe’s main chambers beyond the reliable destructive reach of America’s most powerful conventional bunker-busting weapon.Bombing its exposed entrances could deny Iran access without destroying the facility or anything stored inside.Trump said Tuesday that the United States would probably strike the area "pretty soon" and "very heavily."TRUMP THREATENS 'MAJOR MILITARY PUNISHMENT' FOR IRAN OVER FUTURE HOUTHI ATTACKSHis warning came after The Wall Street Journal reported that Israeli intelligence believes Iran moved thousands of centrifuges into Pickaxe last fall.
Trump said the transfer "may have" occurred but added that the United States did not have it "on record.""Maybe this...