Iran inflicted billions in damage to American intelligence sites during US-Israeli aggression: Report

Four officials familiar with the damage told NBC News that the destruction represents an unprecedented setback for US intelligence agencies.

Since CIA was established in 1947, it has never experienced attacks on its facilities and equipment on a similar scale, the officials said.

Iranian missiles and drones hit intelligence sites as well as conventional military targets, including a CIA office in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and an intelligence center in Iraq’s Sulaymaniyah Province.

Radar systems and other surveillance equipment were also struck, along with fixed electronic intelligence stations, satellite communications systems and data-processing centers.

Power lines and cooling systems needed to operate high-technology equipment were damaged, reducing Washington’s ability to monitor developments across West Asia.

The strikes also spread across a wide geographic area, with an earlier assessment finding more than 100 targets.

Those countries included Qatar, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, the report said while it put the number of damaged US bases at 16.

The financial toll is enormous, with the American Enterprise Institute estimating that infrastructure repairs alone could exceed $5 billion, excluding damaged equipment and weapons.

The US Department of War requested $67 billion in emergency funding in late July, including $18.2 billion to replenish Patriot, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD), Standard Missile-6 (SM-6) and other advanced missiles.

The cost of the wider war has also been staggering, with Bloomberg reporting that the US fired 13,629 munitions at Iranian targets between February and April.

CBS News estimated the total cost of the aggression at no less than $50 billion, while Joint Chiefs Chairman Daniel Caine warned that renewed fighting could dangerously deplete US interceptor supplies.

The attacks have also exposed failures in American preparations, prompting questions over why US facilities were not better protected against Iran’s growing missile and drone capabilities.

Seth Jones of the American Enterprise Institute offered a blunt assessment, saying, “The US walked into this war and had not sufficiently thought through base defense in any way, shape or form, and we got hammered."

The latest round of US-Israeli aggression against Iran began on February 28, when Washington and Tel Aviv forces launched large-scale strikes on Iranian territory.

Iran responded with daily waves of missiles and drones targeting US and Israeli assets.

Although Iran and the US signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on June 17 in an effort to end the aggression, repeated US attacks on southern Iran violated the agreement.

Iranian authorities have since suspended all contact with Washington until it ends its military attacks and hostile rhetoric.