Sen. Mark Warner, the ranking member on the Senate Intelligence Committee, offered a cautious assessment of US strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities after Trump administration officials gave a classified briefing to the chamber on Thursday.
“Clearly, damage was inflicted on the Iranian nuclear program,” Warner said, though he added that “it is going to take time to get a final assessment of how much damage.”
Sen. Elissa Slotkin, a former CIA analyst and member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, also said her takeaway from the briefing was that “it’s still too early to know exactly what the battle damage was, and that’s normal.”
Still, like Warner, Slotkin said she thinks what she heard from officials about the strikes “was significant both in terms of setting back the program but then also in the mentality of the regime.”
She stressed that the intelligence community and the military “should be nonpartisan, apolitical.” The military conducts strikes and then the intelligence agencies assess the damage, “and that’s by design, right, so you’re not cooking the books from the military,” Slotkin said.
“That’s going to take a minute,” she added.
.jpg?w=300&resize=300,300&ssl=1 "Real Madrid player ratings vs. RB Salzburg: Vinicius Jr finds his groove and Federico Valverde stands out as Los Blancos finish Club World Cup group stage with win")
