Exhausted Iran faces USSR-style reckoning, DC-based experts say

“Two thousand-ton blocks are being built on the site, the second and the third. Work is progressing,” Rosatom’s Director General Alexey Likhachev told state-owned television channel Russia-1 TV.

Likhachev said construction of the new units was advancing with major structural components being installed.

The work, he added, involves around 3,000 specialists, including about 700 Russian citizens.

In September, Iranian state media reported that Likhachev and Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization chief Mohammad Eslami signed a memorandum on cooperation for small nuclear power plants in Iran.

In early June, Reza Banazadeh, head of the Bushehr facility announced that Iran plans to expand its nuclear power capacity over the next 18 years with the construction of two additional units at the Bushehr nuclear plant.

The second unit, he added, will take 10 years to complete and the third around eight years. Once finished, the three units would generate a combined 3,100 megawatts of electricity, he added.

Banazadeh said at the time that 2,000 Iranian specialists operate the Bushehr plant, which he described as a showcase of domestic capability.

“All critical roles, from control rooms to maintenance, are handled by Iranian experts,” he said.

Amid the Iran-Israel war in June, an Israeli military spokesperson cited by Reuters said on June 19 that Israel had struck the Russian-built Bushehr nuclear plant — an assertion Reuters reported the spokesperson later said had been made “by mistake.”

On the same day, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Israel had agreed to ensure the security of more than 200 Russian employees working at the Bushehr nuclear power plant.

A day later, Likhachev said the situation at Bushehr nuclear power plant, where hundreds of Russian specialists work, was under control.

“Things that might succeed in the short term may have very different consequences long term,” the paper quoted Malley, who served under US President Donald Trump's predecessor Joe Biden, as saying.

The region’s history, he added, is “a whole list of military 'successes'” that later backfired.

Malley pointed to Israel’s military actions in the region, including attacks in Beirut and against the Palestine Liberation Organization in Tunis, as well as the US invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan and the American intervention in Lebanon.

He said these supposed short-term “victories” often “end up boomeranging,” with consequences that included the rise of Osama bin Laden, stronger Iranian influence in Iraq, the Taliban’s return to power and the emergence of Hezbollah.

Malley told the newspaper that Israeli and US attacks on Iran in June revealed the extent of Israeli access to Iranian airspace and intelligence related to Tehran’s nuclear and missile programs.

The attacks, he said, showed that “Israel had supremacy over Iranian airspace and extraordinary intelligence” regarding Iranian personnel and facilities.

That assessment could affect Tehran’s calculations if it considers rebuilding parts of its nuclear program, Malley said.

“If Iran chooses to restore or resume its nuclear program, it’s going to have to think many times, because it knows that Israel is watching and the US is watching,” he said.

Malley said the June strikes “did set back Iran’s nuclear program,” though “it didn’t obliterate it in the way that President Trump said,” the report added.

Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons, but Israel and Western countries doubt its intentions. Washington has demanded Tehran end all domestic enrichment.

Diplomatic breakthrough or further escalation?

On the outlook for US–Iran relations, Malley said he could imagine either further military escalation or a diplomatic breakthrough under President Trump.

“I wouldn’t be surprised” by renewed US–Israeli strikes, Malley was quoted as saying, but he added that he “wouldn’t be shocked” if Washington and Tehran reached an understanding that halted Iranian enrichment in exchange for sanctions relief and restored UN inspections.

Malley warned that deep mistrust in Tehran has made negotiations more difficult, telling the newspaper that Iranian leaders believe Trump “betrayed them not once, not twice, but three times.”

US talks with Tehran over its disputed nuclear program began earlier this year with a 60-day ultimatum. On the 61st day, June 13, Israel launched a surprise military campaign which was capped with US strikes on June 22 targeting key nuclear sites in Esfahan, Natanz and Fordow.

Iran said on Saturday that its Revolutionary Guards had intercepted the M/V Talara, a Marshall Islands-flagged tanker, in Iranian territorial waters a day earlier over alleged cargo violations.

It was the first tanker seizure by Tehran since Israeli and US strikes on Iran in June, raising concerns about the safety of commercial shipping carrying energy supplies in the world's largest oil-exporting region.

Columbia Shipmanagement on Monday said the tanker's captain made contact with the company at 1730 GMT on November 16.

“All crew members are reported to be safe and accounted for. The vessel is now safely anchored off the coast of Bandar Abbas,” it said in a statement, adding that 21 seafarers were on board.

The company said contact was lost with the vessel on November 14 while it was transiting international waters via Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates to Singapore with a cargo of high sulphur gasoil.

“Columbia Shipmanagement is working with regional partners to urgently resolve the situation and secure the release of our crew,” the company said.

The company's statement came a day after US Central Command (CENTCOM) accused Iran of violating international law and urged Tehran to explain the legal basis for the seizure.

Iran has stepped up maritime enforcement in recent months, especially in waters near the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf, where fuel smuggling remains a persistent issue due to price differences with neighboring countries.

The IRGC announced the seizure was part of what it describes as efforts to curb fuel smuggling. It has in the past often cited alleged smuggling, technical violations or other miscellaneous maritime offences for seizing vessels.

Senior Israeli officials cited in Israeli media reports in recent days allegedly warned that Trump's hawkish administration provided the last best chance to unseat Iran's clerical rulers, their arch-foe in the region.

The officials, the Jerusalem Post and Kan News reported, argued that Iran’s refusal to relinquish its nuclear program means the country's leadership needs to be dismantled.

“I don’t think it’s a game changer,” Hessami, a political science professor of Iranian origin said. “It may be a change in the rhetoric, but the reality on the ground doesn’t change.”

Hessami says even the way regime change is being framed is vague and inconsistent.

“If by regime change you mean Khamenei’s death, or a totally different form of government, or a friendly government, you have to ask the officials what they mean,” he said. “To me, it is more rhetoric than reality.”

Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons and accuses Israel and Western powers of undermining its sovereignty.

Heavy not finishing blows

The idea has surfaced as Israel reassesses its posture after Operation Rising Lion and the coordinated US strike, Operation Midnight Hammer.

Both operations dealt heavy blows to Iran’s nuclear infrastructure but did not alter the core structure of power inside the country.

Israeli intelligence is also warning that Iran is shifting key elements of its nuclear program underground. Officials say Tehran is building a hardened complex known as Pickaxe Mountain, far from any meaningful international oversight.

Intelligence assessments suggest Iran has also expanded its war planning and is preparing for the capability to fire up to two thousand missiles per day if attacked again.

'No regime change for air'

Still, Hessami argues that none of these developments make regime change more attainable.

The events of the twelve-day war in June, he says, showed the limits of military action. Israel destroyed command centers and killed senior Iranian officials, yet Iran’s political and security structure remained intact.

“You can win the war in seven days or seven weeks, but can you win the peace,” he said. “You cannot do regime change from the air.”

He adds that the assumption Israeli strikes would trigger mass unrest or fractures inside Iran misunderstands the country’s political psychology. Even Iranians who resent the system often resist foreign interference.

“People may be upset, but they don’t want a foreign government to determine what the next government should look like,” he said. “The structure of power was intact.”

Hessami draws parallels to past miscalculations in Iraq and Afghanistan, where outside powers relied on exiled voices or optimistic intelligence that did not reflect realities inside the country.

“They were led to believe there would be a revolution or a coup d’etat,” he said. “That hasn’t happened.”

While the alleged Israeli warning reflects rising anxiety over Iran’s nuclear acceleration, Hessami says the timeline being floated is detached from Iran’s entrenched institutions and from the global history of foreign intervention.

Mehdi Abbasi told the Didban-e Iran news site that “the issue is not who may have done this, but that all assumptions that could lead to harm must be identified.” 

Without naming Israel, he said “Experience has shown that with the relevant civil-defence tests, it is possible to thoroughly examine such equipment. And since there is always a possibility that our information could be transmitted abroad, we must consider the most dangerous scenarios and prepare ourselves to confront them.”

He said foreign devices used in urban monitoring systems “must pass multiple security filters” and that Tehran should minimize reliance on imported technology.

Abbasi said authorities should prioritize domestic production of traffic-camera systems, adding, “In a world where countries are either competing or hostile, we must strengthen our internal capabilities first.”

He also said the municipality “should have exercised greater oversight” of the equipment and warned that any technology with internet connectivity must undergo cybersecurity testing by Iran’s civil-defense units.

Iranian officials have not released technical details of the alleged data breach, but the issue has resurfaced repeatedly among senior figures following the 12-day war with Israel.

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  What we know about alleged Israeli strike on Iran's National Security Council

In September, a senior lawmaker claimed that Israel learned the location of a June 16 meeting of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council through the country’s urban surveillance network.

“All the city cameras at our intersections are in the hands of Israel,” said Mahmoud Nabavian, a member of parliament’s national security committee. “Everything on the internet is in their hands – meaning that if we move, they find out.” 

Iranian media reported that the meeting – attended by the heads of the country’s three branches of power – was struck by six bombs or missiles, and that President Masoud Pezeshkian and several other officials suffered minor leg injuries while trying to escape.