More Damage Assessment; Iran's AD Being Probed

Thomas Keith has a must read assessment of the damage to the Fordow nuclear site in Iran, which was targeted by B2 bombers dropping GBU-57 MOP bombs. The disturbing but unavoidable conclusion is that Trump has been gaslighting the American public:

Thomas Keith @iwasnevrhere_

Fordow’s post-strike tableau tells the real story: two 40-ton yellow crawlers are trench-cutting across the north adit, scooping out fractured limestone and pumping spoil onto a new berm that runs 120 m downslope, exactly where the MOP crater sheared the access road.

Fresh spectral whitening around the twin exhaust shafts is crushed dolomite powder, not vitrified rock; that means the GBU-57 burn front never got close to the vaulted centrifuge halls buried under Qom’s ridge. U.S. bragged their 30 k-lb “mountain-eater” punches 60 m of soil or 20 m of 5 000 psi concrete; Fordow’s roof is limestone rated >8 000 psi, so the blast died in the overburden, leaving the tunnels structurally intact and now being vacuum-cleaned back to operational status.

Maxar’s Friday pass even shows a chalk-bright spur road bulldozed from the eastern spur intersection to the crater lip, a textbook debris-extraction corridor, while surface transformers and the substation pad are already rewired.

In short: Washington dropped eight-figure bunker busters for a glancing flesh wound.

Reports just coming in that drones are probing Iran’s air defenses:

Thomas Keith @iwasnevrhere_

1h

Multiple Iranian cities activated air defenses tonight, Shiraz, Nasimshahr, and possibly others, reportedly in response to quadcopter activity.

These were ISR assets, likely tasked with collecting radar data: sweep intervals, lock-on thresholds, response delays. Flying at low altitude with small signatures, they’re ideal for mapping short-range air defense systems like Tor-M1 or Khordad-15 without triggering higher-tier interceptors.

Their presence in multiple locations suggests a coordinated probe, launched from close range, either from inside Iran or from neighboring territory. No damage was reported because damage wasn’t the objective. The goal was to absorb telemetry, test radar saturation points, and evaluate Iran’s multi-layer defense net.

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Multiple explosions reported in Nasimshahr, south of Tehran. Iranian air defense systems have been activated, with residents confirming both interception sounds and visible tracers in the night sky.

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Reports emerging that Iranian air defenses are currently engaging a target over Shiraz, Fars Province. Unconfirmed if it’s a hostile UAV, reconnaissance probe, or misidentified radar echo, but engagement protocols suggest real-time interception, not a drill.

I just got done listening to Danny Davis saying that Iran’s air defense system had been “shredded.” I very much doubt that, although damage was unquestionably done. The reason I doubt that is because there were no reports of Israeli manned fighters actually penetrating Iranian air space in any significant way—all damage was done via standoff weapons from outside Iranian air space or by drones. Smaller drones suitable for assassinations or for unhardened targets were launched from inside Iran—we’re getting reports that the Iranian security services are, belatedly, locating and seizing a lot of these drones. The larger attack drones were probably launched from Azerbaijan, Iraqi Kurdistan, and possibly from the Gulf region. In the latter stages of the war Iran was achieving success in shooting down these drones.

Iran is a vast and mountainous country. It seems significant that the current drone activities are directed at urban areas and involve smallish quadcopter drones. This suggests the purpose is to assess the current state of Iranian air defenses in these areas, which are likely to be targeted again. However, that may not presage attacks via manned aircraft. More advanced air defense missiles can easily be secreted in mountainous areas to scan approaches from outside Iranian air space, making attempts to penetrate Iranian air space by manned aircraft dangerous. That explains the reliance on standoff weapons and drones in this first stage of the war. It remains to be seen what systems the Iranians acquire from Russia and China, and whether in the next round they decide to engage aircraft outside their own air space.

Now, for an indication of the sophisticated capabilities the Iranians possess:

Thomas Keith

@iwasnevrhere_

Israel pushed an Orbiter 4 ISR drone, tail #73, across Iranian airspace. Iran landed it intact using signal warfare. GNSS was spoofed mid-flight.

Most Israeli drones operate on dual-band GNSS modules, often Israeli-American chipsets embedded with firmware signed in Tel Aviv or Palo Alto. These systems, when saturated with higher-fidelity false coordinates, can be coerced into believing they’ve arrived at base. Iran’s signal corps can spoof BeiDou, GPS, and GLONASS overlays simultaneously, especially near hardened facilities with mobile EW relays.

Once the drone is destabilized mid-air, the Command and Control uplink, often based on S-band or Ku-band, becomes the next soft target. If the drone fails to handshake with its original controller due to intentional interference, fallback protocols may engage. Iran exploits these auto-handshake routines to inject false controller IDs, mimicking base station signatures, overriding return-to-base protocols, and locking the drone into a descent vector.

Captured wreckage confirms the use of modular flight control boards running real-time operating systems (RTOS) vulnerable to packet injection, buffer overflows, or zero-day radio stack flaws. Once a UAV is partially hijacked, replay attacks and system parameter spoofing can paralyze onboard logic, forcing it into "safe landing" mode. Think of it as a signal-based seizure, no explosion, just quiet submission.

Every drone downed like this is a goldmine: optics telemetry, firmware hashes, encryption salt ranges, even operator keystroke patterns. Iran’s EW units intercept, catalog Israeli tactics, techniques, and payload structures. Every captured drone becomes a simulation module for Iran’s C4ISR wargaming suite, a ghost of Zionism hardwired into the Islamic Republic’s battlegrid.

10:17 AM · Jun 28, 2025

Lastly:

MenchOsint @MenchOsint

4h

According to new elements, it's now confirmed that US Air Force's F-15s, F-16s, F-35s, F-22s from Prince Sultan Air Base & Muwaffaq Salti Air Base and E/A-18G from the Aircraft Carrier USS Vinson participated in the US bombing of Iran

The Fighters dropped 75 precision munitions in a suppression of enemy air defense (SEAD) mission, supporting the B-2s. (@TieDyeIntel)

Soureh @Soureh_design2

This interesting billboard refers to The Battle of Edessa

When the Romans (the West) under the command of Emperor Valerian attacked the Sassanid

But they were defeated and Valerian was captured himself

(This amazing 1800 years old rock relief is located near Shiraz)