Counter-proliferation, or state-sanctioned use of force such as military strikes, cyber-strikes, electronic warfare, assassinations, or sabotage against nuclear facilities or personnel, has been undertaken a few times in the past as a way of ensuring non-proliferation.

The US had considered a pre-emptive strike on China’s nuclear facilities in the early part of 1964 to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons. Washington had even tried to probe Moscow as a collaborator, but it showed no interest in the move. Nearly two decades later, on 7 June 1981, Israel attacked and partially destroyed Iraq’s Osirak nuclear research reactor at Tuwaitha, alleging that it was part of a weapons enterprise. The research reactor was under IAEA safeguards. From the second half of the 2000s, Israel and the US used targeted assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists as well as the cyberattack through Stuxnet on several Iranian nuclear facilities, particularly affecting the centrifuge plant at Natanz in 2010.

Most recently, in June 2025, overt military air strikes were carried out on Iran’s military and nuclear infrastructure, first by Israel, and then by American bunker busters to destroy the underground, fortified nuclear facilities at Natanz, Fordow, and Isfahan. While President Trump was quick to claim that the targets had been obliterated, the extent to which these Iranian facilities have been damaged is still a matter of conjecture more than a month after the attacks. Satellite images do show fairly extensive damage at targeted sites, but it is unclear whether Iran’s nuclear weapons ambitions too have been obliterated. Conversely, these may well have been strengthened given that the underlying issues of hostility between Washington, Tel Aviv, and Tehran remain as knotty as ever.

The immediate trigger for the Israeli/US attacks was pinned on the IAEA report of 12 June 2025, which stated that it found Iran to be in breach of its safeguards obligations, though it also stated that it was not able to explicitly establish with credible evidence that there was a coordinated nuclear weapons programme either. The suspicion, however, provided an opportunity to Israel, especially since it perceived that Tehran had already been significantly weakened as a result of the ongoing war against Hamas, Hezbollah, and Syria, all of which were seen as bulwarks of Iranian security.

Counter-Proliferation to Non-Proliferation?

Will counter-proliferation lead to a success story of non-proliferation in Iran? After all, Iran does have a robust nuclear power programme with multiple nuclear sites and capable engineers and scientists. While the attacks would surely have caused a setback to Iran’s nuclear programme, will it also have broken Iran’s resolve to have a nuclear power programme in which it enjoys the right to hosting the full fuel cycle, including an enrichment programme? It may be recalled that Tehran had fiercely fought for this right during the negotiations of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). The deal had finally been able to balance Iran’s right to enrichment and the objective of non-proliferation by allowing Tehran to enrich uranium to 3.67 per cent. But, after the US withdrawal from the JCPOA in 2018 during the first Trump administration, Iran steadily increased its enrichment capability and the amount of enriched uranium over the past five years. The stockpile of uranium enriched to 60 per cent was estimated to have gone up to about 400 kg in 2025. But the material was under IAEA safeguards, as were all of Iran’s nuclear facilities, before the military strikes.

Until now, there are no confirmed reports on the stockpile of the 400 kg of uranium that Iran was known to have enriched to 60 per cent. After the attacks, IAEA expressed no knowledge of the whereabouts of the uranium. Whether Iran moved it in toto or in batches to undisclosed locations, or whether the material got buried in the attacks, is not known. This is, however, a matter of concern for two reasons. One, in case it is in the custody of Iranian nuclear authorities, it could become the raw material for making a weapon if Tehran so desires. The country does have the know-how to build centrifuges once again. Unlike the case of the military attack on Osirak, Tehran has a far more robust nuclear programme. Second, if Tehran too is unaware of its whereabouts in the fog of the crisis, the material, even in small quantities, could pose a risk of nuclear terrorism.

Optics and their Impact

The precedent of unilateral military action by a non-NPT state known to possess nuclear weapons, in collusion with another nuclear weapon state (NWS), against a non-nuclear weapon state (NNWS) member of the NPT sets a troublesome example. At one level, it has cast aspersions on the credibility of the IAEA. In fact, this is what former IAEA Director General Sigvard Eklund had said after the Israeli attack on Osirak, cautioning about a possible threat to the non-proliferation regime in 1981: “From a point of principle, one can only conclude that it is the Agency’s safeguards regime which has been attacked.”

At another level, alongside the case of the Russian attack on Ukraine, this makes for two instances of non-nuclear weapon states being subject to military action, different though these may be. In the eyes of those NNWS that see a threat perception from NWS, these attacks raise the value of nuclear weapons. Counter-proliferation, therefore, may end up undercutting non-proliferation.

If Iran decides to step out of the NPT, it would be a serious blow to the treaty. The NPT is already on shaky ground owing to fissures among the states parties. Iran’s parliament has already approved suspending cooperation with the IAEA. If Iran continued to stay in the NPT, the RevCon in 2026 would face headwinds as Tehran raises its grievances. It could well be able to mobilise sympathy for its position with the support of Russia and China.

The Iranian case might also serve as a lesson for other countries wanting to acquire nuclear weapons, that they should not sit on the fence or indulge in hedging for too long. Once the decision has been taken, it should quickly demonstrate the capability through tests, lest military strikes be used to attack national nuclear facilities. Therefore, counter-proliferation could end up weakening non-proliferation.

How to Ensure Victory for Non-Proliferation

If a different outcome is desired, then it needs to be recognised that military strikes alone cannot destroy Iran's nuclear programme, despite the setback that they might have caused. Unless this advantage is quickly consolidated through a political agreement that fairly addresses Iran’s security concerns, the action could only end up strengthening Tehran's resolve to reconstitute its nuclear activities with the nuclear knowledge that still resides within the country.

Therefore, to ensure an outcome other than this, it is imperative to turn to proactive diplomacy with Iran. The first step should be to get Iran to return to IAEA inspections. The next attempt should be to have it accept limits on its programme under broad verification. Getting Tehran to agree, however, will require negotiating non-attack guarantees, allowing sanctions relief, and accepting Iran’s demand for enrichment as part of its nuclear programme.

Fortunately, the E-3—UK, France and Germany—have stepped up negotiations with Iran, who reportedly consulted with Russia and China before this engagement. Given the fractured state of great power politics, there are big question marks on the future of these talks. In the ultimate analysis, it is the US administration that must ensure that it is diplomatically able to encash the benefits of its military strikes.

Unless a quick way is found to assuage and rehabilitate Iran, this could be a festering wound that, as Former US Defense Secretary Robert Gates had warned in 2012, would continue “haunting us for generations in that part of the world.” He had feared that attacks “would make a nuclear-armed Iran inevitable. They would just bury the program deeper and make it more covert.” President Trump has an opportunity to shape an alternative future for the region provided his administration can muster the capability and the foresight to present him with credible options that can satisfy both Tehran and Washington.

Dr. Manpreet Sethi is Distinguished Fellow at the Centre for Air Power Studies (CAPS) in New Delhi and Senior Adviser at the Asia-Pacific Leadership Network (APLN).