IRAN’S mad mullahs could pose a bigger threat to world peace than ever after brutally crushing a nationwide rebellion, experts warned yesterday.
Fanatical Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has clung to power by ordering a mass slaughter feared to have claimed the lives of more than 12,000 protesters.
But his weakened and cornered regime has continued to hone its terrifying arsenal of ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons programme while killing its people, sources said.
Donald Trump called off strikes on the Islamist state’s leadership and military machine on Wednesday after being assured that plans to execute arrested protesters had been stopped.
But analysts fear the rogue state’s rulers now realise their days are numbered — and are preparing to launch a terrifying Doomsday last stand.
Experts have told The Sun that much of Iran’s deadly nuclear material — nearly half a ton of enriched uranium — survived the B-2 bomber blitz ordered by Trump last summer.
The terror state is also planning to launch an apocalyptic 2,000- missile attack on its hated enemy Israel in a conflict set to dwarf last June’s 12-Day War.
Thousands of Israelis were left cowering in bomb shelters as Iran launched 550 ballistic missiles and more than 1,000 suicide drones seven months ago.
The biggest single attack was a salvo of 200 ballistic missiles which left three people dead and 60 injured — as more than ten per cent of the incoming rockets dodged Israel’s interceptor shield.
Shunned peace pleas
But analysts have now revealed Iran — using technology shipped in from China — plans to launch ten times as many upgraded ballistic and hypersonic missiles simultaneously.
The unprecedented salvo threatens to overwhelm Israel’s Iron Dome, David’s Sling and Arrow 3 defences and plunge the Middle East — and world powers — into crisis.
World War Three fears are spiralling again after Iran repeatedly refused to rejoin negotiations to curb its nuclear ambitions and shunned Trump’s peace pleas.
As protests raged across the entire nation for 18 days, ballistic missile production lines continued to work 24 hours a day on the orders of Khamenei.
Donald Trump ordered America’s first direct action against Iran in June in a bold bid to thwart the mullahs’ secret plans to build a nuclear weapon.
Seven bat-winged American B-2 Stealth Bombers dropped 14 Massive Ordnance Penetrator GBU-57 bombs on atom plants at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan.
“Unfortunately, I don’t share the view that Iran’s nuclear programme was obliterated
The B-2s flew a 13,600-mile nonstop return trip from America’s Whiteman Air Force Base backed by tankers and more than 100 fighter jets.
Trump boasted that the huge 14-ton bombs “totally obliterated” the terror state’s nuclear sites.
Iran’s most prized underground laboratory at Fordow was, alone, smashed by six GBU-57 bunker busters, prompting the US president to post the message “Fordow is gone”.
But reports have since revealed that Iran spirited away nearly half a ton of 60 per cent enriched uranium from three atom plants before the dramatic strikes.
And Israeli spies and US satellites fear bomb material has now been ferried to a new fortified Doomsday plant under a peak dubbed Pickaxe Mountain.
Dr Raz Zimmt of Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies — who has studied Iranian threats for three decades — told The Sun: “The potential for escalation and for this to get very, very serious is very high.
“If we get to the next round of war I expect Israel to target not just military sites or nuclear facilities or missiles — they will hit oil installations and the Islamic regime itself.
“My concern then would be that Iran would hit back by launching more missiles and escalate the conflict with attacks on US interests or even Arab Gulf states.”
Dr Zimmt warned that battle damage assessments and satellite imagery gleaned after the 12-Day War will dash peacemaker Trump’s hopes.
He said: “Unfortunately, I don’t share the view that Iran’s nuclear programme was obliterated.
“For the last few years, it was very clear that even a successful US and Israeli combined military strike against Iran’s nuclear programme was not going to fully destroy its nuclear capabilities.
“We know that at least 400kg of fissile material — meaning enriched uranium to 60 per cent — still remains inside Iran.
“If the 60 per cent uranium is enriched to a higher military level of 90 per cent, this would be enough to produce ten nuclear bombs.”
Efforts to tame Iran have been dashed further as the Islamist nation’s military experts and weapons plants appeared to have been moved further underground.
And the regime’s new secret plant — built deeper than ever under hundreds of metres of solid rock — is feared to be the site of an upgraded enrichment plant.
Dr Zimmt said: “Pickaxe Mountain is a site which is located south of one in Natanz targeted by Israel and the United States.
“They may decide to take the fissile material and enrich that either in this new facility in the mountain or in Isfahan.
“It’s actually even deeper than the site in Fordow — a few hundred metres down — which will make it even more difficult to target.”
‘A cornered mad dog’
Ali Vaez, the Iran project director at the International Crisis Group warned the regime is likely to abandon all restraint if Israel attacks again.
He said Iranian officials boasted that missile factories are now working 24 hours a day, adding: “They hope to fire 2,000 at once to overwhelm Israeli defences, not 500 over 12 days.
“Iran’s leaders are fanatical and determined and still in possession of serious weaponry capable of triggering catastrophic events across the region.
“Israel feels the job is unfinished and sees no reason not to resume the conflict, so Iran is doubling down preparedness for the next round.”
Iran has always denied having atom bomb aims — and remains under tough sanctions after a 2015 deal to limit its uranium enrichment was abandoned.
And its leaders now seem to have given up on diplomacy while ruthlessly crushing all dissent and doubling down on their plans to wage war again.
Defiant Khamenei said: “America’s arrogant nature accepts nothing but surrender.”
His Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi went on to reject pleas for direct talks and a halt to uranium enrichment, accusing the US of setting “unacceptable and impossible conditions”.
UK defence analyst and historian Paul Beaver told The Sun: “Trump must know there can be no ever- lasting peace in the Middle East as long as the current regime in Iran stays in place.
Source : https://www.the-sun.com/news/15795114/iran-doomsday-retaliation-ballistic-missiles-nukes/