Name: How Iran's nuclear program has evolved
Uploaded: 2026-02-27T23:01:31.000Z
Duration: 5 min 5 s
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Iran and the US are set to continue nuclear talks this week in Geneva as President Trump weighs a potential military action in Iran.

Iran's nuclear program dates back decades, to the days when it was a US ally.

In the 1960s, the US gave Iran a small research reactor, but

after ties were broken following Iran's revolution, its Islamic regime started acquiring nuclear technology in secret, including centrifuges to enrich uranium, according to the International Atomic energy agency, or IAEA.

In 2002, an anti regime group alleged that Iran had secretly built a pair of nuclear facilities, while US Intelligence assessed that Iran halted efforts to develop nuclear weapons in 2003.

Iran later resumed enriching uranium and faced years of sanctions as a result.

In 2015, the Obama administration and other global powers struck an agreement with Iran to limit its nuclear program, with IAEA inspectors allowed in to verify its compliance.

Known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the deal capped its uranium stockpiles for 15 years and enrichment capacity for 10 years in exchange for sanctions relief.

The deal had a so called snapback mechanism allowing the UN Security Council to reimpose sanctions if Iran violated the deal.

After the IAEA certified Iran was complying, the U.S.

and European nations unfroze about $100 billion worth of Iranian assets.

But in 2018, President Trump withdrew the U.S.

from that deal, calling it horrible and one sided and imposed new sanctions, dubbing it a maximum pressure campaign demanding that Iran accept a stricter nuclear deal and end its support for groups like Hezbollah.

The Biden administration and European parties tried to revive the deal but weren't successful.

Since then, Iran has stopped abiding by the terms of that agreement, including by enriching uranium to 60% purity for the first time, according to the IAEA, which is a technical step away from from weapons grade level.

Last June's airstrikes targeted Iran's Fordo and Natanz enrichment facilities and a research site near the city of Isfahan.

It's not clear how much the strikes damaged Iran's nuclear program.

Iran downplayed the impact but has not allowed any independent inspections.

It's also not clear how long it would take Iran to build a bomb.

CBS News has previously reported that one intelligence summary released last May estimated it could take Iran probably less than a week to produce enough weapons grade uranium to make its first, while another intelligence report from last year projected it could take between three to eight months to make a nuclear device.

Now President Trump says he wants to negotiate a new nuclear deal with the threat of another attack on Iran if it doesn't comply.

She's the director and senior adviser of the Middle East Program at the center for Strategic and International Studies.

So last night President Trump cited Iran's nuclear program as a threat after previously saying its nuclear facilities were obliterated following last June's attack.

Is it about the protesters or regime change?

I mean, I think last night the president really was not able to offer significantly more clarity on what kinds of objectives the US has in mind should it choose to undertake military action against Iran.

He laid down three different types of accusations against Iran.

He talked about Iran potentially seeking to restart its nuclear program.

He talked about Iran having ambitions to build missiles that could reach the United States.

And he also mentioned Iran's role in the past during the US War in Iraq in which Iranian backed militias built very powerful IEDs that led to thousands of Americans being killed.

So he laid all of those different rationales down, but

he didn't really provide a compelling case for what direction the US Is going to go in and what the American people should expect should the US Launch another military strike on Iran.

CBS News has learned that the president is frustrated with the limited military options his team has presented to him.

He's been told that any strike on Tehran would almost certainly not be a singular decisive blow.

How might a prolonged conflict impact the region?

You know, there's the potential, for example, that there is spillover, that Iran goes after neighboring Gulf countries, certainly US Military assets and bases in Gulf countries, but

potentially in order to inflict more harm, even start to go after energy infrastructure in neighboring countries, as Iran has done in the past, Iran could also and likely would attack U.S.

I think in this case, Iran is signaling that it is not interested in a limited tit for tat with the U.S.

if the U.S. chooses to strike Iran, Iran is seeking to impose costs on the United States.

And this is the complexity that the president is facing should he decide to move forward.