Biden briefed on plans for potential US strikes if Iran makes nuclear move — report

Source tells US news site that presentation by Jake Sullivan was part of ‘prudent scenario planning,’ in case Tehran attempts dash for bomb before Trump takes office

US President Joe Biden confers with his National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan during a roundtable with Jewish community leaders at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, October 11, 2023 in Washington. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images/AFP)
US President Joe Biden confers with his National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan during a roundtable with Jewish community leaders at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, October 11, 2023 in Washington. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images/AFP)

White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan recently presented US President Joe Biden with options for potential American strikes on Iranian nuclear sites if Tehran decides to move toward a nuclear weapon before the inauguration of Donald Trump later this month, according to a report on Thursday.

The presentation was made in a secret briefing several weeks ago, the Axios news site reported, citing three officials.

One of the officials said the meeting was not sparked by new intelligence and that Biden did not make a final decision.

The source said the meeting was part of “prudent scenario planning.”

Another source said Biden was focused on the question of whether Iran had taken nuclear steps that create an urgent situation that would justify such a dramatic military strike a few weeks before a new president takes office.

The news site highlighted comments Sullivan made at a conference last month on Iran’s nuclear program, in which he noted the “strategic blows” the Islamic Republic has suffered with the fall of the Assad regime in Syria, Israeli attacks on its soil and the battering of Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Hamas in Gaza.

“You can look at the public statements of Iranian officials, which have changed in the last few months as they have been dealt these strategic blows, to raise the question: Do we have to change our doctrine at some point? The fact that that’s coming out publicly is something that has to be looked at extremely carefully,” he said at the time.

A man treads on a damaged portrait of slain Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and late IRGC Quds Force general Qassem Soleimani as Syrians loot the Iranian embassy in the capital Damascus on November 8, 2024. (Omar Haj Hadour / AFP)

The Axios report came weeks before Trump’s return to the White House, where during his first term in office he waged a “maximum pressure” campaign on Iran that included the withdrawal of the US from Iran’s 2015 nuclear pact with six major powers and reimposed harsh sanctions on Tehran. Iran, in turn, violated the pact’s nuclear limits, with moves such as rebuilding stockpiles of enriched uranium, refining it to higher fissile purity and installing advanced centrifuges to speed up output.

Indirect talks between Biden’s administration and Tehran to try to revive the pact have failed, but Trump said during his election campaign in September: “We have to make a deal because the consequences are impossible. We have to make a deal.”

On Wednesday, the semi-official ISNA news agency cited Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi as saying that the next round of nuclear talks between Iran and three European countries will take place on January 13 in Geneva.

Iran held talks about its disputed nuclear program in November 2024 with Britain, France and Germany.

Those discussions, the first since the US election, came after Tehran was angered by a European-backed resolution that accused Iran of poor cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog.

Tehran reacted to the resolution by informing the IAEA watchdog that it plans to install more uranium-enriching centrifuges at its enrichment plants.

Atomic Energy Organization of Iran spokesman Behrouz Kamalvandi (R) and Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharib Abadi (L), posing with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Rafael Grossi (2nd L), outside the Natanz nuclear enrichment plant in Iran’s Isfahan province, November 15, 2024. (Atomic Energy Organization of Iran / AFP)

UN nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi told Reuters in December that Iran is “dramatically” accelerating its enrichment of uranium to up to 60 percent purity, closer to the roughly 90% level that is weapons-grade. While Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ostensibly opposes the manufacturing of a nuclear weapon, Iran is enriching uranium at levels that are only relevant for the assembly of such bombs. The Islamic Republic is dedicated to the destruction of Israel, with Jerusalem vowing not to allow the regime to build a bomb.

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