In Russia and Iran, the pursuit of nuclear knowledge leads scientists to perilous fates

By Global Watch | 2025-07-25

The brightest minds in missile and nuclear science are becoming casualties -- not just of war but of a deeper, systemic collapse within Russia and Iran's scientific communities.

Global Watch is exposing how targeted assassinations, internal purges and brain drain have transformed prestigious state-run academic and weapon programs into traps that endanger those who join them.

For engineering students, former researchers and policymakers, this is a cautionary tale: the pursuit of cutting-edge weapon expertise in authoritarian regimes increasingly means risking your career, your freedom or even your life.

In Iran, the mysterious death of physicist Ardeshir Hosseinpour in 2007 marked the beginning of a deadly pattern. Although Iran attributed his death to gas poisoning, many observers say his death was part of a covert assassination campaign against Iran's nuclear scientists.

Between 2010 and 2020, at least five more Iranian researchers tied to nuclear or missile programs were killed in suspicious bombings and shootings. The Iranian government publicly condemned these attacks, with officials like Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander Hossein Salami calling the perpetrators "blind-hearted enemies" and promising severe retaliation. However, instead of retaliation, the noose tightened around Iran's weapon program.

In June 2025, Israeli forces conducted what they termed Operation Narnia, killing nine senior Iranian nuclear scientists in coordinated strikes. These scientists, including figures like Fereydoun Abbasi and Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi, were central to Iran's nuclear weapon development, with their deaths reportedly setting back the program by years.

Salami himself was killed in June in Tehran in an Israeli air strike.

Rising internal pressure

Official Iranian statements framed the assassinations as acts of martyrdom and defiance, but internally and externally the program faces growing instability.

Across Russia, missile and aerospace scientists face a similar fate -- albeit from different opponents. Last December, an electric scooter bomb killed Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, commander of Russia's Radiological, Chemical and Biological Defense Forces, in Moscow -- an operation widely attributed to the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).

Just days earlier, missile scientist Mikhail Shatsky, known for upgrading cruise missiles such as the Kh-59, was fatally shot near Moscow, another strike reportedly linked to Ukrainian intelligence.

Meanwhile, internal pressure is mounting. Following Russia's losses and battlefield setbacks in Ukraine, Russian police arrested top aerospace researchers such as Valery Zvegintsev, Anatoly Maslov and Alexander Shiplyuk in connection with treason charges.

Now the Kremlin accuses them of undermining the state's hypersonic missile program. Its growing paranoia is transforming respect for expertise into suspicion, pushing many scientists either into exile or prison.

Together, these developments reveal a harrowing truth: state-sponsored missile and nuclear programs in Russia and Iran -- once pillars of national pride and scientific advancement -- have become perilous corridors where "scholastic decapitation" squanders or eliminates talent.

The intelligence-driven assassinations from outside and purges from inside have fractured these communities, deterring new generations of scientists from participation and imperiling those who remain.

For current students and former participants in these programs, the risks have never been higher.

In the next article in this series, Global Watch will further unravel how the Russian brain drain and Iranian assassination campaigns are leading to a dangerous pursuit of nuclear knowledge and capability.