Iran Has Been Sealing Off Its Stockpile of Uranium

By Hugh Fitzgerald | June 14, 2026

Anti-aircraft guns (Samavat 35mm Anti Aircraft Guns (Oerlikon 35mm)) guarding Natanz Nuclear Facility, Iran by Hamed Saber, Creative Commons Attribution 2.0

Hmm. What’s wrong with this picture? Trump keeps saying, and Vance dutifully echoes him, that a deal is “close” that will ensure that Iran surrenders all of its stockpile — some 140 kg. — of uranium that had been enriched to a just-below-weapons-grade of 60%. But surely, then, Iran shouldn’t be making it harder — perhaps impossibly harder — for that uranium to be retrievable.

Could Janus-faced fork-tongued Iran, whose fanatical rulers know that Muhammad said “war is deception,” be setting up a situation where it offers Trump the theoretical possibility of retrieving that uranium and at the same time moves heaven and earth to make sure that the uranium is in fact irretrievable? More on Iran’s destruction of tunnels, and booby-trapping of entrances, can be found here: “Iran booby traps entrances, collapses tunnels leading to cache of enriched uranium – report,” Jerusalem Post, June 13, 2026:

Iran has escalated efforts to seal off its stockpile of enriched uranium, collapsing tunnels, and placing explosive mines at entrances in recent weeks, CNN reported on Saturday, citing five sources familiar with US intelligence.

This comes a day after a senior administration official told reporters that the US and Iran are close to a deal requiring Iran to relinquish its uranium, which has been enriched to near-bomb grade, according to the US.

Reuters also reported on Friday that the emerging US-Iran deal will include the dismantling of the Iranian nuclear program and allowing the US to collect the regime’s enriched uranium.

However, details of how the uranium will be extracted have not been made clear.

US President Donald Trump has repeatedly stated that retrieving the uranium is one of the US’s priorities in negotiations, although he has claimed that only the US and possibly China have the capability to do so.

But as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps beavers away in Iran, putting explosives at entrances to the uranium stockpile sites, and destroying tunnels, show the bad faith of the Iranian government, doing all it can to make sure that the retrieval of that uranium becomes nigh impossible.

A CNN report from Friday stated that the US had originally planned to launch a ground mission into Iran to recover the uranium, but that Trump had paused the operation.

In an interview with 103FM, former defense minister Yoav Gallant said that the US and Israel could and should have combined forces to retrieve the uranium during the war.

“We should have gone and brought the enriched uranium by force in a military operation during the campaign. That would have uprooted the nuclear program from Iran,” he said…

Yoav Gallant is right. It was madness for Trump to have forced Israel to call a halt to its war with Iran after just twelve days. He should have let Israeli commandos enter Iran to find and bring back to Israel that enriched uranium when Iran had just been battered and such seizure was still possible. Netanyahu should have told Trump “our forces are already on the ground in Fordow and Isfahan, it’s not possible to call them back, and when we get the uranium we will consult with you as to how, and where, to destroy it.”

Right now, Trump should call a halt to giving final approval to the deal, stating that will only happen if the Iranians stop trying to make access to the 440 kg. of 60% enriched uranium impossible, and instead remove both the explosives they have planted at the entries to the sites, and whatever rubble they have piled up in the collapsed tunnels leading to those sites. Furthermore, no unfreezing of Iranian assets will take place until after Iran either hands over the uranium itself, or allows Americans to find, seize, and transfer all of that highly-enriched uranium outside of the country, where it can be destroyed.