US CENTCOM chief says Iran targeting civilians out of ‘desperation’

The exchange of threats marks a sharp escalation in the three-week-old war and raises the prospect of tit-for-tat strikes on civilian infrastructure across the region.

“If Iran’s fuel and energy infrastructure is attacked by the enemy, all energy infrastructure, as well as information technology and water desalination facilities belonging to the United States and the regime in the region will be targeted,” Iranian military spokesman Ebrahim Zolfaqari said, according to state media.

Much of the region depends heavily on energy-intensive desalination plants for drinking water, including systems that supply all potable water in Bahrain and Qatar and the majority of water used in the United Arab Emirates.

Iran’s parliament speaker Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf warned on X that attacks on Iranian power plants could lead to the “irreversible destruction” of energy facilities across the Middle East.

Foreign minister Abbas Araghchi struck a softer tone, saying that Tehran had not yet moved to choke off global shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.

“The Strait of Hormuz is not closed,” he wrote on X. "hips hesitate because insurers fear the war of choice you initiated—not Iran."

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards also warned that the Strait of Hormuz — the route through which roughly a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas normally passes — would remain shut until Iranian power plants damaged in the conflict are rebuilt.

The escalating rhetoric comes as fighting between Iran and Israel continued overnight.

Dozens were reported injured in Iranian missile strikes on the southern towns of Arad and Dimona on Sunday night.

The rising threats have prompted diplomatic intervention.

In a call with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, France’s President Emmanuel Macron urged all sides to halt attacks on energy and civilian infrastructure and called on Iran to restore freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz.

“It is more essential than ever that all parties agree to establish a moratorium on energy and civilian infrastructure,” Macron said in a post on X.

More than 2,000 people have been killed since the United States and Israel launched attacks on Iran on February 28, a conflict that has rattled global markets, pushed up fuel prices and raised fears of a broader regional war.

The short answer is that Iran’s power system is large, heavily dependent on thermal generation, and widely dispersed – making it difficult to disable through limited military strikes.

A system built on thermal power

According to Iran’s Ministry of Energy, the country has around 40.6 million electricity subscribers, including 32.3 million residential users.

Although official figures put hydroelectric power at 13.4% of capacity, the actual share is less than 5%, largely due to reservoir conditions.

Instead, Iran relies overwhelmingly on thermal power plants, which generate more than 95% of its electricity.

There are about 130 thermal plants across the country, with a combined capacity of 78,000 megawatts. Among them, around 20 plants exceed 1,000 megawatts, and three exceed 2,000 megawatts.

Where the power is generated

The largest facility is the Damavand power plant, with a capacity of about 2,900 megawatts.

Also known as the Pakdasht plant, it covers roughly 200 hectares and is located 50 kilometers southeast of Tehran on the Khavaran road. Its construction cost was close to 2 billion euros.

The Neka (Behshahr) power plant, also around 200 hectares, is located along the Caspian Sea in Mazandaran province and has a capacity of about 2,200 megawatts.

The Rajaei power plant, along the Karaj-Qazvin road, produces around 2,000 megawatts and spans about 350 hectares.

Around Tehran, five major plants – Damavand, Rajaei, Montazer Ghaem, Roudshour (Rudshur), and Mofatteh – play a central role in supplying electricity.

Within the capital itself, smaller plants – Besat, Rey, Tarasht, and Parand – operate at much lower capacity. The largest among them, Parand, produces about 950 megawatts, while Besat generates around 250 megawatts and Tarasht only 50 megawatts.

Hard targets, limited impact

Large power plants are not easy targets.

A facility like Damavand, with multiple cooling towers and units spread across 200 hectares – roughly 30 times the size of Tehran’s Azadi Square – would require a wide-scale attack to fully disable.

Even then, the impact on the national grid would be limited.

The complete destruction of Damavand would remove only 3.7% of Iran’s total electricity generation capacity. Part of that loss could be offset by halting about 400 megawatts of electricity exports.

A decentralized grid

Iran’s electricity system is not concentrated in a few locations. Its transmission and sub-transmission network extends about 133,000 kilometers, and when urban and rural lines are included, the total exceeds 1.3 million kilometers.

The system is supported by 857,000 transformers and an estimated 2,000 to 5,000 large and medium substations across the country.

Strikes on substations could cause temporary, localized outages, but they can be replaced relatively quickly.

For example, after blue flashes were seen in the skies over western Tehran and Karaj – likely caused by explosions at power substations – electricity in western Tehran was cut temporarily before being restored.

Can Iran be plunged into darkness?

Given this scale and dispersion, targeting one or several power plants is unlikely to cause a nationwide blackout.

Even significant damage would be absorbed by the broader network, limiting the impact to specific areas and short timeframes.

Revolutionary Guard Aerospace Force commander Majid Mousavi has come under criticism from senior IRGC officials for being absent during ongoing clashes and leaving his forces without leadership, sources with knowledge of the matter told Iran International.

The main criticism, according to the sources speaking to Iran International on condition of anonymity, centers on the commander’s lack of presence on the ground at a time when operational pressure has significantly intensified since the start of the war in late February.

Sources say that as casualties have mounted within the Aerospace Force—responsible for missile and drone launches—Mousavi’s absence has been cited as a key factor contributing to the deteriorating situation.

Aerospace Force operators have described the operational conditions as highly dangerous, with each missile launch mission carrying extreme risk and, in some cases, likened to near-suicidal operations, according to the informed sources.

At the same time, sources say families of some personnel have filed complaints with senior IRGC authorities, saying that the commander did not maintain an effective presence under dangerous conditions and that forces were effectively left without adequate support.

Continue reading

The main criticism, according to the sources speaking to Iran International on condition of anonymity, centers on the commander’s lack of presence on the ground at a time when operational pressure has significantly intensified since the start of the war in late February.

Sources say that as casualties have mounted within the Aerospace Force—responsible for missile and drone launches—Mousavi’s absence has been cited as a key factor contributing to the deteriorating situation.

Aerospace Force operators have described the operational conditions as highly dangerous, with each missile launch mission carrying extreme risk and, in some cases, likened to near-suicidal operations, according to the informed sources.

At the same time, sources say families of some personnel have filed complaints with senior IRGC authorities, saying that the commander did not maintain an effective presence under dangerous conditions and that forces were effectively left without adequate support.

Additional allegations have also surfaced, including claims of mismanagement and the provision of inaccurate data regarding missile strikes and launch figures by the force.

Seyyed Hossein Mousavi Eftekhari, known as Majid Mousavi, is a brigadier general in the IRGC. He was appointed commander of the Aerospace Force on June 13, 2025, following the killing of his predecessor, Amir-Ali Hajizadeh, in an Israeli strike.

Prior to his appointment, Mousavi served from 2009 to 2025 as deputy commander of the Aerospace Force, where he played a key role in the development and management of Iran’s missile and drone programs.

The IRGC Aerospace Force is considered one of the Islamic Republic’s most important military branches, overseeing the country’s ballistic missile program, offensive drone capabilities, and parts of its air defense systems.

Mousavi is under US sanctions. On December 18, 2024, the US State Department announced sanctions against him over his role in the development of Iran’s ballistic missile and drone programs.

His appointment came at a time when the Aerospace Force was already under intense operational and security pressure. The force continues to play the most important role in the ongoing conflict.

On the last day of February, as reports emerged that Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei had been killed in an Israeli bombardment, it was also announced that a meeting of the Defense Council had been struck.

Several senior figures were killed in the strike, the Israeli military confirmed on March 16.

Among those killed were Ali Shamkhani, a senior adviser to Khamenei and secretary of the Defense Council; Abdolrahim Mousavi, chief of staff of Iran’s armed forces; and Aziz Nasirzadeh, the defense minister.

Also killed were two figures associated with Iran’s Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research, known by its Persian acronym SPND, the direct successor organization to Iran’s pre-2004 nuclear weapons program.

The two figures were former SPND chief Brigadier General Reza Mozaffarinia and the organization’s new head Brigadier General Hossein Jabal Ameli.

Washington has sanctioned more than 30 SPND scientists and multiple affiliated entities, accusing the organization of overseeing “dual-use research and development activities applicable to nuclear weapons and nuclear weapons delivery systems.”

While Tehran denies pursuing a nuclear weapon, the UN nuclear watchdog and Western powers including the US and its European allies maintain that Iran's high-level uranium enrichment (up to 60%) has no credible civilian justification.

Iran currently possesses some 400 kg of near-bomb-grade enriched uranium. The US and Israel have in recent days discussed sending special forces into Iran to secure the stockpile at a later stage of the war, according to a report by Axios.

US War Secretary Pete Hegseth said Thursday that President Trump saw Iran advancing ever closer to nuclear capability and viewed it as unacceptable, prompting his decision to launch the war against Tehran.

Why A-bomb was focus of Defense Council meeting

There are four reasons suggesting the meeting of the Defense Council was likely related to the final stage of decision-making on constructing a nuclear weapon.

First, the composition of the gathering is a key indicator. The simultaneous presence of two former and current SPND chiefs alongside the defense minister — their superior — suggests the meeting concerned nuclear matters rather than battlefield operations. If the session had been focused on the war itself, senior operational or battlefield commanders would have been expected to attend instead of officials tied to the nuclear weapons industry.

Second, Ali Shamkhani had publicly spoken about nuclear weapons months earlier. Four months before his reported death, he said in an interview that if he could go back in time during his tenure as defense minister, he would build an atomic bomb.

Third, Shamkhani’s roles placed him at the center of coordination between multiple institutions. As Khamenei’s senior adviser and secretary of the Defense Council, as well as a former defense minister, he maintained extensive ties with officials within the ministry, including the department responsible for special weapons development, SPND.

He was also described as a senior commander overseeing Revolutionary Guard officers involved in nuclear weapons development and as the link between these networks and Khamenei himself.

Fourth, in one of his final public remarks, Shamkhani told Lebanon’s Al-Mayadeen television that a war with the United States and Israel was inevitable and that the Islamic Republic needed to prepare for it.

Taken together, these elements may indicate that the meeting struck in the bombardment may have been connected to the final stage of decision-making regarding nuclear weapons development.

It is unknown whether Israel was aware that the gathering concerned possible deliberations over building a nuclear weapon, or whether it targeted the meeting simply because senior Iranian officials were known to be present.