The rationale is stated at the highest level and in the strongest terms. In Manila on July 23, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the central issue is 'these lunatics in possession of a nuclear weapon' [2]. At the White House the next day, the president said that 'if they have even the thought of a nuclear weapon, we would just continue to go, but at much higher levels' [3].
What can actually be verified about that program is a shorter document than either statement implies.
According to the Institute for Science and International Security's analysis of the IAEA's June 2026 reporting, the agency stopped conducting verification activities in Iran under the NPT safeguards agreement after February 28, 2026 [1]. Inspectors have not been doing the work since.
The last date the stockpile was actually verified is June 13, 2025. The figures then: 440.9 kilograms of uranium enriched to 60 percent, 184.1 kilograms at 20 percent, 6,024.4 kilograms at 5 percent, 2,391.1 kilograms at 2 percent, and 834.4 kilograms in other forms [1]. Those are the last real numbers anyone has.
Access had been narrowing before that. Since June 2025 Iran has denied the agency entry to 20 declared nuclear sites and one location outside facilities [1].
The agency's own account of what it can say now is unusually plain for a technical body. It 'cannot provide any information on the current size, composition or whereabouts of the stockpile of enriched uranium in Iran,' and it is 'unable to verify the suspension of Iran's uranium enrichment, plutonium reprocessing, and heavy water production programs' [1].
None of this establishes that Iran is building a weapon, or that it is not. That is the point. The war is five months old, and the factual question at its centre has gone unmeasured for thirteen [1].
