Iran’s reopened underground missile sites show limits of US bombing plan

 

Satellite images show Iran's efforts to excavate the entrances to its underground missile bases, after they were blocked by US and Israeli bombing.

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Iran is poised to fire far more long-range missiles at Israel and other Middle Eastern nations after rapidly digging out its buried arsenals – an effort that highlights the limits to US bombing strategy, experts said.

For weeks, strikes by the United States and Israel restricted Iran’s access to its underground missile sites by destroying roads and burying tunnel entrances.

But satellite images reviewed by CNN show how Iran has used simple equipment such as bulldozers and dump trucks to counter those costly campaigns — suggesting that Tehran’s missile capabilities can’t be destroyed just by targeting tunnel entrances, experts said.

While Iran and the US have reached a tentative agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, months of work remain to hammer out details.

If hostilities do resume, Iran is in position to “continue launching missiles so long as they have launchers and crews, even if production has halted,” said Sam Lair, a research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies who analyzes Iran’s missile capabilities. “There’s nothing to prevent the launchers from being armed with the ample stockpile of missiles that the Iranians still have.”

At a missile base in Dezful, Iran, four of the five entrances to the underground facility could be seen reopened on May 12. Circled in gray is the one entrance to the complex that remained blocked.

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During the fighting, Iran worked to excavate the tunnel entrances at great peril, with the US and Israel often striking the equipment used for digging. That work enabled Tehran to continue firing missiles throughout the war, though at vastly reduced rates. Since the ceasefire more than seven weeks ago, Iranian efforts to excavate the bases have accelerated significantly.

CNN found that Iran has now unblocked 50 out of the 69 tunnel entrances struck by the US and Israel at 18 underground missile facilities.