A specialist in national security and ex-commander from the US Air Force special operations highlights that the United States ought to be mindful of the potential threat of Iran-linked terrorist organizations acquiring nuclear capabilities.

Glenn Ignazio told Today a US strike on Iran’s Fordow nuclear enrichment facility would be a “surgical” and “tactical” attack.

Any US involvement in the current conflict, he said, would likely be focused on that one manoeuvre.

“Yet the definition of ‘war’ is getting momentum, and people have to understand the difference,” he said.

“No ground troops, there’s no war planned. It’s this particular event.”

And Ignazio said he backed US involvement – though maybe not for the reasons previously touted by US hawks.

“People are saying, are (Iran) going to really strike somebody else? It’s not really that worry,” he said.

“I think it’s proliferation of their terrorist factions that really concerns me, of a nuclear capability getting out.

“So the idea of shutting this not just now, but forever, that’s where I sit on it, that I think it needs to be done.”

Recent American intelligence reports, dismissed by both the Israeli administration and Trump, suggested that Iran was not on the verge of developing a nuclear weapon.