Qualla: Fordow Uranium Enrichment Plant

Fordow Uranium Enrichment Plant: Introduction

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

For years, it did not officially exist. Construction began in 2006 at a former Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps base 20 miles north of Qom, Iran's holiest Shia city, but the Fordow Uranium Enrichment Plant was only disclosed to the International Atomic Energy Agency in September 2009 -- after Western intelligence services had already found it. Built deep inside a mountain to resist aerial attack, targeted by the Stuxnet cyberweapon, constrained by international agreement, and ultimately struck by American B-2 bombers in June 2025, Fordow became the most contested piece of underground real estate on Earth.

Fordow Uranium Enrichment Plant: A Facility That Was Not There

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Iran revealed Fordow's existence on 21 September 2009, touching off an international crisis. President Barack Obama announced that the facility had already been under U.S. surveillance. Western officials condemned Iran for concealing the site; the IAEA stated that Iran was bound ...

Fordow Uranium Enrichment Plant: Centrifuges and Cyberweapons

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Fordow was designed to house approximately 3,000 centrifuges across 16 cascades, producing uranium hexafluoride enriched up to 5 percent U-235. In September 2011, Iran announced it would move production of 20 percent low-enriched uranium from the larger Natanz facility to Fordow,...

Fordow Uranium Enrichment Plant: The Deal and Its Collapse

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Under the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, Fordow was to cease uranium enrichment for at least 15 years and be converted into a nuclear physics research center. The facility would retain no more than 1,044 IR-1 centrifuges, with two cascades repurposed for medical isotope...

Fordow Uranium Enrichment Plant: Bunker Busters Over Fordow

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

In June 2025, amid the Iran-Israel war, Israeli forces struck Fordow on June 13, though the subterranean enrichment halls, buried deep in the mountain, appeared to survive the initial attack. On June 22, American B-2 Spirit bombers dropped twelve GBU-57A/B Massive Ordnance Penetr...