(Dave DeCamp, Antiwar.com) Vice President JD Vance on Thursday attempted to justify the continued US-Israeli war against Iran by implying that Iran could potentially turn a nuclear bomb into a suicide vest, a claim not grounded in reality.
Vance made the claim during a cabinet meeting while discussing military and diplomatic “options” that the US has regarding the conflict with Iran. He has continued to portray the war as being necessary to prevent Iran from making a nuclear weapon, though there was no evidence that Tehran had decided to build a bomb either before the June 2025 war or the current war that was launched on February 28.
“What we have now that we didn’t have when the president took over, just a little over a year ago, is the ability to use every tool at our disposal to ensure that Iran doesn’t get a nuclear weapon,” Vance said.
“Because when I say options, I think it’s important the American people know options for what? And it’s options to ensure that Iran never has a nuclear weapon,” the vice president added. “You talk about people who walk into a crowded supermarket and have a vest on, and they blow up the vest and a couple of people get killed, and that’s a terrible tragedy. What happens when what’s on the vest is not something that can kill a couple of people, but can kill many, many tens of thousands of people?”
A nuclear bomb could not be miniaturized to the point where it could be worn as a vest, and if Vance was alluding to a “dirty bomb” that uses some nuclear material, such a weapon at that size would not cause tens of thousands of casualties. Plus, in recent decades, the overwhelming majority of suicide bombings in the region were carried out by Sunni Muslim extremists, not Iran and its Shia allies.
Before the US and Israel launched the war, Vance became one of the leading voices in the administration, making the claim that the coming conflict was about preventing Iran from developing a nuclear bomb, contradicting President Trump’s insistence that US airstrikes in June 2025 “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program. At one point, Vance even claimed there was evidence Iran was trying to “rebuild a nuclear weapon,” something Iran has never had.
This article originally appeared at Antiwar.com.
