# U.S. Builds White Sands Test Site to Model Strikes on Iran’s ‘Pickaxe Mountain’ Nuclear Complex

*Wednesday, September 9, 2026 at 4:11 PM UTC — Hamer Intelligence Services Desk*

**Published**: 2026-09-09T16:11:09.934Z (2h ago)
**Category**: intelligence | **Region**: Middle East
**Importance**: 8/10
**Sources**: OSINT
**Permalink**: https://hamerintel.com/data/articles/17365.md
**Source**: https://hamerintel.com/summaries

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**Deck**: A Pentagon memo shows Washington funding an emergency weapons‑test site at White Sands, New Mexico, to simulate attacks on Iran’s deeply buried ‘Pickaxe Mountain’ underground nuclear facility, as reports say Tehran is expanding the site for possible enrichment.

As Iran drives its nuclear work deeper underground, the United States is quietly reshaping a desert test range to figure out how to reach it.

A recent Pentagon memo shows that Washington awarded an emergency $1.2 million contract to prepare weapons tests for a “classified capability” at a subterranean range at White Sands National Park in New Mexico. Three unnamed sources cited in U.S. media say the test plans are tied to Iran and to the challenge of striking its most hardened nuclear facilities, in particular an underground complex known as Pickaxe Mountain.

According to separate reports, Iran is expanding that site and may be carrying out enrichment work in tunnels bored into the rock. If that’s the case, it would shift sensitive nuclear activity into a location U.S. planners see as beyond the reach of existing conventional weapons.

Those same reports say current U.S. assessments hold that only tactical nuclear warheads could reliably destroy Iran’s deepest sites today, a threshold Washington does not want to cross. The tests at White Sands are meant to mimic the geology and depth of Pickaxe Mountain so that engineers can study alternative options without disclosing details.

For people living near such underground complexes in Iran, the infrastructure is largely invisible, but it makes their regions central to U.S. targeting scenarios. For U.S. personnel and contractors at White Sands, the new facility reflects a shift in the nuclear file from questions about centrifuge numbers to questions about how much rock advanced munitions can punch through.

Strategically, the dynamic is straightforward. Iran invests in hardening and depth to keep its program out of reach. The U.S. responds by trying to extend the reach of non‑nuclear weapons. That back‑and‑forth makes any future crisis around Iran’s nuclear activities more difficult to manage, because both sides will have sunk resources into tools designed for worst‑case confrontations.

This underground contest is unfolding alongside Iranian ballistic‑missile launches at bases used by U.S. forces in Jordan, claims of an Iranian air‑defense shoot‑down of a U.S. MQ‑1 drone over the Strait of Hormuz, and a surge of hostile activity around tankers in the Gulf and the Gulf of Oman.

Key signals from here will include further visible construction at the Pickaxe Mountain complex, any public hints from Washington about new conventional strike options, and how the International Atomic Energy Agency responds to evidence of possible enrichment in hardened facilities. Moves by Iran to limit inspector access or step up missile testing around the same time would reinforce the sense that the underground race is advancing faster than diplomacy.