Newsweek recently reported that a cluster of U.S. scientists have been killed or died or gone missing. Not just any scientists, like botanists. But scientists with direct connections to national security. Included among the dead and missing are a couple of nonscientists who were administrative personnel at government nuclear and aerospace research or production facilities. They held security clearances.
The U.S. deaths aren’t isolated. Newsweek reported that China has experienced a brain drain, too. Over the last few years, a bunch of Chinese scientists have died – scientists whose work involved military and national security programs.
Declared Newsweek: “[The dead and missing have] prompted a disturbing question among some [unnamed] military analysts: Is there a silent ‘scientist war’ going on?”
In a time when grabbers exaggerate to generate clicks, the temptation is to dismiss such speculation as nonsense. Except for this: Iran’s decades-long efforts to develop nuclear weapons may provide a clue.
The U.S. and Israel have been implicated in the assassinations of Iranian scientists involved in Iran’s now largely defunct atomic weapons program. The assassinations aren’t just recent, however. They’ve happened since the early 2000s. Targeted killings during wartime are a different matter.
As far back as 2012, the Council on Foreign Relations reported:
Driving in rush hour traffic yesterday morning in Tehran, Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, chemical engineer and department supervisor at the Natanz uranium enrichment plant, was killed. Reportedly, two men on a motorcycle attached a “sticky bomb” to Ahmadi Roshan’s Peugeot, killing the scientist and his bodyguard.
Although estimates vary, Ahmadi Roshan is the fifth Iranian official or scientist connected to the country’s nuclear or ballistic missile program who has been violently killed since 2007. Another scientist, Fereydoon Abbasi, narrowly escaped a similar “sticky bomb” assassination attempt in November 2010—he now leads Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization.
Back in 2012, Barack Obama was president. Hillary Clinton was secretary of state. The Obama administration denied U.S. involvement. Assassinations of Iranian scientists occurred during the Bush administration, too, which prompted official denials then.
During last year’s “Twelve-Day War” (June 13-24), the Foundation for Defense of Democracies reported (June 14, 2025): “Israel eliminated nine top scientists and experts whose knowledge was critical to Tehran’s [nuclear weapons] initiative.”
The FDD analysis continued:
Tehran has long denied that it ever had a nuclear weapons program, but the evidence clearly shows otherwise. The effort was initially known as the Amad Plan, but amid fear of discovery in 2003, the clerical regime downsized and dispersed the program’s activities to preserve them while allowing the work to progress on a more limited scale. Many became part of the Organization for Defense Innovation and Research, known by its Persian acronym, SPND.
All nine of the scientists killed by Israel this week were involved in the Amad Plan, and some were currently working on weaponization efforts, according to Western government sources who shared information with FDD. Between 2007 and 2012, Israel assassinated five other nuclear scientists who were part of the Amad Plan or subsequent activities.
In a December 3, 2020, article, Voice of America discussed the killing of “Iran’s nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh by unknown assailants last week [as] the latest in a string of targeted killings of figures behind Tehran’s atomic program.”
Israel and the U.S. clearly have motive for eliminating scientists helping develop nuclear weapons for a terror state. There are practical and moral justifications for doing so.
Nonetheless, per the VOA article, “Israeli officials have neither confirmed nor denied the allegations [about the Fakhrizadeh assassination]. U.S. officials have denied playing any role in [any] killings.”
What else would both nations say? Acknowledging peacetime assassinations sets a sticky precedent – assuming such killings weren’t already part of the cloak and dagger world.
Yet, if the Israelis didn’t commit the killings, perhaps (or likely) with the support of U.S. intelligence, who did?
The Gulf Arab states might be culprits, though would they have the sophistication and reach to accomplish the missions?
Has the Times of Israel settled the question? In a September 2, 2022 “inside story,” it reported:
Ever since the Mossad intelligence service embarked on its Operation “Wrath of God” to hunt down senior terrorists it blamed for the Munich bloodbath, it has covertly targeted Israel’s enemies overseas.
Today “Israel is using targeted killings as one of its main weapons in its policy of defending national security interests,” [Ronen Bergman] said. [Bergman is the] author of the book “Rise and Kill First” about Israel’s targeted killings.
What, pray tell, do Iranian scientists’ assassinations have to do with the deaths or disappearances of American and Chinese military, nuclear, and aerospace scientists?
Perhaps killing scientists is now a battlefront in covert operations that the U.S. and China are waging against one another? Making that determination requires details about the deaths and disappearances. Context matters. A cursory review suggests some deaths are explainable. But a deeper dive is happening.
U.S. House Oversight Committee chairman, Republican James Comer, is launching an investigation. The Trump administration is engaging.
Per The Hill, April 17:
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Friday that the Trump administration is looking into whether there may be a link among nearly a dozen American scientists who have reportedly died or gone missing in the past almost three years.
Leavitt wrote in a post on social platform X that the White House is working with the FBI and other relevant agencies “to holistically review all of the cases together and identify any potential commonalities that may exist.”
But if the Chinese are eliminating U.S. scientists, and Uncle Sam is eliminating theirs, how transparent would congressional and executive branch investigations be?
It’s also possible that China’s communist regime is killing its own scientists, those who’ve become inconvenient for whatever reasons. Communist regimes are known to dispose of persons who become hinderances.
The clusters of dead and missing American and Chinese scientists may just be handy for stoking social media traffic. Conspiracies of one stripe or another are routinely featured on social media accounts. Tucker Carlson spins his share.
Much to the chagrin of conspiracy enthusiasts, it’s altogether possible that the deaths and disappearances of U.S. and Chinese scientists are coincidences. Yes, coincidences happen – even colossal ones. Yet, in an era of accelerating distrust of institutions, social upheaval, and aforementioned hype, people are more prone to accept dark, ulterior motives to explain chance events.
Defaulting to conspiracies are a means of making sense when guideposts have been “deconstructed” and long-trusted institutions have been hijacked by self-serving – too often corrupt – and ideologically blinkered elites. Deep political divisions across society contribute to suspicions as well. In every generation, there are people who want to believe that random and improbable events are engineered. Capriciousness is unsettling.
Still, in light of the Iranian assassinations, the question nags: Is Iran the only theater where such operations occur?
The U.S. and China are geopolitical rivals. The day may come when they’re belligerents. The stakes are awfully high. Advancements in science and technology – particularly pertaining to national security – are pivots in the Sino-American contest. Missiles, drones, lasers, nuclear weapons, nanotechnology, AI – you name it – all hinge on the highest caliber scientific research and development. The best minds and talents are required.
Has randomness made for a curious coincidence? Coincidences really do happen. Or is the public learning about a new dimension in the fight for global supremacy?
Is, as Newsweek suggests, “a silent ‘scientist war’ going on?”
