Should we be worried about Iran's missiles and nuclear ambitions?

Iran has reportedly supplied missiles to Russia for its war in Ukraine, defying Western opposition. This development coincides with Tehran’s increasing proximity to becoming a nuclear power, raising further global concerns

This comes as a new report by the Associated Press questions just how accurate Iran’s long-valued missile program is, raising doubts about the abilities of Iran’s missile arsenal.

The report by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies has not been posted online yet and was shared exclusively with the AP. Iran International reached out to the center’s analysts who were not able to provide an interview.

Farzin Nadimi, a Senior Fellow at the Washington Institute, specializing in the security and defense affairs of Iran and the greater region, and Jay Solomon, an investigative reporter with The Free Press, joined Iran International’s English podcast, ‘Eye for Iran’ to provide insight into the nature of Iran’s missile program and how it relates to getting closer to a nuclear bomb.

To analyze the precision of Iran’s missile program, Nadimi, said we need to look at the whole picture. Sometimes it can be a failure like many Iranian missiles failing to launch and crashing before their intended target, but other times it can be successful and deadly.

Analysts at the non-proliferation center studied the Islamic Republic’s strike on the Nevatim Air Base in Israel with what was believed to be its Emad missile and assumed that Iran was targeting Israeli F-35I fighter jet hangers. They measured the distance between the hangars and the impact zones of the missiles, concluding an accuracy range of 1.2 kilometers, which is far less than the advertised.

“At least since 2017, Iran has been using ballistic missiles attacking neighboring countries with a series of solid propellant missiles fired at targets in Syria and Iraq and on several occasions, they were very accurate. In fact, in 2018 they managed to strike the very room in a certain building in Iraqi Kurdistan where a group of dissident Iranian Kurds were meeting and they managed to kill and injure several of the dissident Kurdish members,” said Nadimi.

Understanding just how much danger Iran’s missiles can pose is significant.

The Iranian government continues to vow at striking Israel, promising to avenge the killing of Hamas Leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran. The Israelis have not claimed responsibility but are believed to be behind it. And as Russia pounds Ukraine with missile attacks, the Wall Streel Journal reports that Iran has sent several short-range ballistic missiles to Russia citing US and European allies. Bloomberg also recently reported an imminent delivery of Iranian ballistic missiles to Russia, citing European allies of Ukraine.

Knowing the accuracy of Iran’s missile arsenal would help determine how much of a hit civilians would take in Ukraine – and the severity of any potential attack on Israel.

Iran's missile capabilities and nuclear ambitions are intricately linked. Ballistic missile defense can complement, but not substitute for, the role of nuclear weapons in deterrence. US officials have said the ease at which Israel and its allies intercepted hundreds of Iranian missiles and drones launched at them in April could propel Iranian authorities to obtain greater military capabilities. 

A recent report by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) claims Iran could have a nuclear bomb before the US presidential election. The organization warned that while most US officials monitor Iran’s capacity to enrich uranium to 90%, the Islamic Republic is taking covert steps toward a nuclear weapon.

Iranian government documents, obtained and reviewed by The Free Press, reveal that Tehran is expanding the activities and funding for a Department of Defense unit believed to be at the center of nuclear weapons development.

The organization, known by its Farsi acronym, SPND, has been followed closely by the US, Israel and the United Nations because it's believed to play a key role in covert nuclear weapons research.

“This office has been the focus for a while of this is where the weaponization work has happened,” said Solomon on the Eye for Iran podcast.

Solomon said the expansion of SPND would be in an honor of a nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, who was allegedly the head of Iran’s nuclear weapons program. Fakhrizadeh was killed near Tehran in 2020 allegedly with a remote-controlled machine gun.

After his death, the government said Fakhrizadeh's department would have virtually unlimited funding. "And if you look at these three pillars of Iran's program, the missiles that we'll be talking about, the fissile material, and then actual weaponization work, the fact that SPND is now being ramped up is very troubling," said Solomon.

For more on just how accurate Iran's ballistic missiles are and how it relates to Iran getting closer to becoming a nuclear power, watch the full episode on YouTube or listen on Spotify, Apple, Castbox, or Amazon.