Iran Shows Drone Factory as US and Israel Reportedly Plan New Strikes After Elections

Iranian state television aired footage that it claims shows an underground drone manufacturing facility. The military said production is expanding and that there is more to come. The segment itself notes the footage comes from state media and should be treated with caution.

According to the segment, the broadcast is meant in part to signal that Iran has been rebuilding its stockpile during the past few months of relative quiet in the Middle East war, and that Tehran is ready should fighting resume in a big way.

On Thursday, Iran also claimed that it struck seven oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz. If true, the segment notes, it would be the largest single-day hit in the strait since the war began in late February. US President Donald Trump called those claims fake, saying the Iranian regime was intentionally driving up the price of oil ahead of the US midterm elections.

The segment points to several signs that fighting could resume after Americans vote on November 3. The New York Times reported that the US and Israel are drawing up plans for renewed strikes on Iran after the elections. The Wall Street Journal reported that Iran threatens wider strikes on economic and civilian targets if the US attacks, and The Guardian reported that Iran would hit AI facilities across the Gulf if fighting resumes. US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth also visited Israel earlier in the week and met Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Israel also has elections due in just a few days, so for both countries the timing turns on what happens after the vote.

Asked whether anything beyond Iran's statement verifies that it hit seven oil tankers, Bell said there is no such verification. He said that since the United States launched its attacks on Iran on February 28, the conflict has largely become a war of narrative.

Bell said the recent relative quiet reflects both the run-up to the midterm elections and a stalemate between the two sides. He said the US is providing escorts for oil moving through the Strait of Hormuz, while its blockade of Iranian oil exports remains robust. In his view, the stalemate does not suit Iran, which is why it has been arming the Houthi rebels and trying to cause havoc at the Bab el-Mandeb strait and the Red Sea. Oil prices remain stubbornly high, at record levels in the UK, he said.

Bell's remark about verification is the only assessment in this passage that the segment presents as a direct answer to whether the tanker claims can be confirmed.

Asked how Iran can stock up on weapons given its limited resources and an economy that was already struggling before the war, Bell said Western observers tend to look at such problems through a democratic economic lens. Iran is an autocratic system, he noted, and its leadership has stowed money away for years. He said he has friends with relations in Iran who describe life there as very difficult, but that this has not stopped the leadership from having plenty of money and facilities to make weapons.

Bell also said that although there is a blockade in the Strait of Hormuz, there are many land routes that provide resupply into Iran, so the country is not short of parts and equipment.

Bell said that in military war games he had played Iran, and the might of America always prevailed over conventional Iranian forces. But Iran has prepared to control the Strait of Hormuz with drones, anti-ship missiles, fast patrol boats and mines, all of which he described as very well hidden and very well supplied.

Bell said that although the US has had a successful military campaign, most analysts believe Iran still has at least half of its ballistic missiles and many thousands of drones. In his assessment, America has won the conventional battle and beaten up Iran's air, land and maritime forces, but Iran's capability around the Strait of Hormuz remains very dangerous.

Asked what Trump will do once public opinion matters less after the elections, and noting that the US has moved another aircraft carrier into the region in recent weeks, Bell said a big increase in military action is conjecture. He pointed back to the start of the war, when Trump claimed the war would be over within four to six weeks, that he would have won, and that America's superpower would have devastated Iran.

Bell said that in many respects the US did achieve a great deal in the early stage of the war, but that it has since proven incapable of stopping Iran from controlling the Strait of Hormuz. He said that even if America returned to a military campaign, it looks very unlikely there would be any difference from the campaign that came before. He also argued that Iran has learned from that experience, and that it is already targeting Saudi Arabia and US military facilities in the Middle East, causing great difficulty for America's regional allies. Patriot missile systems, which are vital for defending against ballistic missiles, are now running in very short supply.

Bell summed up his view that there is no military answer to this predicament. If Trump decides to return to using the military, he said, it will not change the game, and all that will follow is more uproar from the Middle East. He argued this is why Middle Eastern states are looking at where they will find their relationships in the future, because America is clearly wavering as a key supporter of their national security.

Asked how much the US has been able to replenish its own resources after running low on expensive weapons, Bell said there is little doubt that supplies bought by NATO countries for Ukraine are already being held back. He said Pete Hegseth has said publicly that these weapons will not be provided, even though NATO paid for them, because the US must first prioritize its own stockpile.

Bell focused on Patriot systems, saying the Iranian ballistic missile threat is significant. He said that for every ballistic missile fired, the US generally fires two Patriots. He said the American industry can replace only about two Patriots a day, and that this is roughly enough to match one ballistic missile, so a single missile can use up the day's supply. If the US were regularly at war with a dozen ballistic missiles fired a day, it would need 24 Patriots, which he called unsustainable. He warned that America would not run out of its ability to strike Iran, but would struggle to help Middle Eastern partners protect themselves, which he said would be dangerous, very unpopular and a source of great diplomatic difficulty in the region.

Asked about the Houthis and their fighting with Saudi Arabia, Bell said the two have been in conflict for many years, but the fighting subsided a few years ago and has continued at a low level. He explained that the Houthis were very poorly equipped, while Saudi Arabia was much better equipped, so the conflict was an irritation rather than something causing Riyadh serious problems. He described the Houthis, Hamas and Hezbollah as Iranian proxies. He said that after Iran became stuck in the stalemate around the Strait of Hormuz, it began providing a lot of high-grade weapons to the Houthis, who have since been able to terrorize the Bab al-Mandab strait.

Bell said the Houthis now have drones and ballistic missiles that they did not have before and that have tragically killed many people in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia had spent much of its oil revenue building a pipeline from the east of the country to the west, so it could load oil into the Red Sea and use the Bab al-Mandab strait instead of depending on Hormuz. Bell said the Houthis are now targeting that route, with the aim of making life uncomfortable, pushing energy prices higher and increasing pressure on Donald Trump.

Host Melissa Chan said the discussion would move from military action to diplomacy, which she described as globally important.

Bell said the meeting is very significant and that much is happening behind the scenes. For many decades, he said, America, the UK and other nations provided strategic security guarantees to the Middle East in return for oil, which he described as oil for arms. But when America suddenly struck Iran, he said, it did not consult Saudi Arabia, Qatar or the UAE. The Middle East has found itself trapped in the middle of a battle, targeted by Iran, losing money and now lives, and is questioning who its strategic partners in the region are.

Bell said the UK agreed this week to provide some Typhoon jets to help protect Saudi Arabia. Militarily, he said, the numbers are tiny, so the effort is much more diplomatic than military.

Bell said that as America becomes less able to provide security guarantees, many nations are asking how the West will step in. If the West does not, he warned, the danger is that China and Russia begin to have that conversation with the Middle East, which would have very worrying consequences for energy supplies, particularly into Europe and the West.

The segment closed with Melissa Chan thanking Bell and noting that DW is following the story and will see whether the fighting resumes after the election.