Level 1 — Absolute Beginner
The war between the United States and Iran is getting worse. American planes have hit targets in Iran every night for more than a week.
President Trump says the US will soon hit a secret place inside a mountain in Iran. People call it Pickaxe Mountain. Experts think Iran hides nuclear machines there.
Iran says an attack on this mountain will make the war much bigger. Iran says it will hit more places across the region if this happens.
Because of the war, many ships stop sailing through the Strait of Hormuz. This is a narrow sea path where a lot of the world's oil travels. Oil prices are now very high.
- strike
- an attack, often by planes or missiles
- nuclear
- related to the energy inside atoms, used for power or weapons
- secret
- hidden or not known to most people
- mountain
- a very tall, natural hill of rock and earth
- region
- a large area, like part of a continent
- ship
- a large boat that carries people or goods on water
- oil price
- the cost of buying oil
- war
- fighting between countries or groups
Level 2 — Elementary
The war between the United States and Iran has entered its second week, with American forces bombing Iranian targets on eleven straight nights. President Trump told reporters that the US would soon strike Pickaxe Mountain, a secret underground facility that intelligence officials believe holds part of Iran's enriched uranium and advanced equipment.
Trump said the US would hit the site "pretty soon, and very heavily." Construction at Pickaxe Mountain sped up after the US struck Iran's known nuclear sites, Natanz, Fordow, and Isfahan, in June 2025, according to satellite photos studied by outside researchers.
Iranian officials warned that an attack on any of the country's nuclear facilities would be treated as a serious expansion of the war. State media reported that senior commanders promised to strike infrastructure and bridges across the wider region in response.
The fighting has also hit the world economy. Ships normally cross the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway between Iran and Oman, about 88 times a day, carrying roughly a fifth of the world's oil. That number has fallen to a small handful of ships on some days, and the price of Brent crude oil has stayed above $100 a barrel, a level not seen in years.
- facility
- a place built for a particular purpose
- enriched uranium
- uranium that has been processed to be usable in reactors or weapons
- intelligence officials
- government workers who gather secret information
- expansion
- making something larger or wider
- infrastructure
- roads, bridges, and other basic structures a country needs
- waterway
- a river, canal, or strait that ships can travel through
- crude oil
- unprocessed oil taken from the ground
- escalate
- to become more serious or intense
Level 3 — Intermediate
As the US bombing campaign against Iran entered its second consecutive week, President Trump signaled that Washington was preparing to broaden its target list to include Pickaxe Mountain, a heavily fortified underground complex, known in Iran as Kuh-e Kolang, that intelligence assessments say now houses enriched uranium stockpiles and advanced centrifuges relocated after the June 2025 strikes on Natanz, Fordow, and Isfahan.
"We'll be hitting that area pretty soon, and very heavily," Trump told reporters, a notable shift from earlier weeks when the site was discussed only as a possible future target. Satellite analysis from the Center for Strategic and International Studies indicates construction at the mountain complex has accelerated markedly since last year's strikes, suggesting Tehran anticipated further attacks on its declared facilities.
Tehran's response has been unusually direct: senior military officials, quoted in state media, warned that any strike on Iranian nuclear infrastructure would be treated not as another round of the existing conflict but as a formal expansion of the war, with retaliation extending to bridges and infrastructure across the wider region rather than being confined to military bases.
The economic fallout has become impossible to ignore. Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, which under normal conditions sees roughly 88 vessel transits a day and carries about a fifth of global oil consumption, has fallen to a handful of ships on several recent days, with commodity tankers among the few still willing to attempt the crossing. Brent crude has held above $100 a barrel, a threshold unseen in years, as insurers and shipping firms weigh the risk of rerouting entirely around the peninsula.
- fortified
- strengthened against attack
- centrifuge
- a machine that spins material at high speed, used to enrich uranium
- stockpile
- a large stored supply kept for future use
- retaliation
- an action taken to pay back an attack
- declared facilities
- sites a country has officially acknowledged to inspectors
- vessel transit
- the passage of a ship through a particular route
- commodity tanker
- a ship built to carry raw materials such as oil or gas
- reroute
- to change the path something travels
Level 4 — Advanced
Eleven consecutive nights into a renewed American bombardment of Iranian territory, the conflict's center of gravity appears to be shifting from a punitive campaign against dispersed military assets toward a far more consequential target: Pickaxe Mountain, the fortified subterranean complex Iranians call Kuh-e Kolang, which US and allied intelligence now assess as the repository for enriched uranium and centrifuge cascades relocated after the June 2025 strikes on Natanz, Fordow, and Isfahan rendered those declared sites inoperable.
President Trump's declaration that the site would be hit "pretty soon, and very heavily" marks a rhetorical escalation from the conditional framing of prior weeks, and it is corroborated by open-source satellite analysis from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, which documents a marked acceleration in tunneling and hardening work since last year, evidence that Tehran anticipated exactly this contingency and moved to place its remaining fissile material beyond the reach of conventional ordnance.
Tehran's public messaging has been calibrated to signal that a strike on undeclared nuclear infrastructure would cross a threshold distinct from the bombing campaign to date, with senior commanders quoted in state media vowing that such an attack would be answered not with proportionate military responses but with a deliberate widening of the war to encompass bridges and infrastructure across the broader region, a framing intended to raise the perceived cost of the strike Washington is weighing.
The economic architecture of the crisis has become as consequential as its military dimension. Transit volume through the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint that under ordinary conditions handles on the order of 88 vessel movements daily and roughly a fifth of global oil consumption, has collapsed to a handful of transits on several recent days, largely limited to sanctioned or opportunistic operators willing to absorb the insurance and security premiums now attached to the passage, while Brent crude's sustained position above $100 a barrel signals that markets are pricing in a protracted, rather than transient, disruption to the world's most important oil corridor.
- punitive
- intended as punishment
- subterranean
- existing or located underground
- repository
- a place where things are stored
- fissile material
- material capable of sustaining a nuclear chain reaction
- ordnance
- military weapons and ammunition
- calibrated
- carefully adjusted to achieve a precise effect
- chokepoint
- a narrow passage that controls access to a wider area
- protracted
- lasting for a long time; prolonged
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