Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard issued a sobering message to the American people last week, sounding the alarm over the devastating consequences of nuclear war amid rising global tensions. Her warning comes just as President Donald J. Trump authorized a major military operation targeting Iran’s suspected nuclear facilities after months of diplomatic deadlock.

In a video posted days before Israel launched its joint mission with U.S. support, Gabbard reflected on a visit to Hiroshima, one of two Japanese cities obliterated by atomic bombs at the end of World War II.

“I recently visited Hiroshima in Japan and stood at the epicenter of a city that remains scarred by the unimaginable horror caused by a single nuclear bomb dropped in 1945, 80 years ago,” Gabbard said. “It’s hard for me to find the words to express what I saw, the stories that I heard, the haunting sadness that still remains. This is an experience that will stay with me forever.”

She went on to recall the aftermath of the Hiroshima bombing — over 300,000 lives lost, many vaporized in an instant, others succumbing to radiation-induced illness and cancers in the months and years that followed. Gabbard also noted the suffering of survivors in Nagasaki, the second city hit by a nuclear weapon.

“These attacks didn’t just destroy buildings,” she said. “They annihilated families, communities, futures. And yet, those nuclear bombs were minuscule compared to what exists in today’s arsenals.”

Gabbard emphasized the stark difference in yield between the 15-kiloton bomb dropped on Hiroshima and modern nuclear warheads, which now exceed 1 megaton.

“Just one of these nuclear bombs would vaporize everything at its core,” she warned. “Radioactive poison would contaminate air, water, and soil. A nuclear winter could follow… killing crops and starving billions.”

The DNI didn’t mince words about where she believes the blame lies.

“As we stand here today, closer to the brink of nuclear annihilation than ever before, political elite and warmongers are carelessly fomenting fear and tensions between nuclear powers,” she said. “Perhaps it’s because they are confident they will have access to nuclear shelters for themselves and for their families — shelters that regular people won’t.”

Gabbard called on Americans to rise above the political class’s reckless behavior: “We must reject this path to nuclear war and work toward a world where no one has to live in fear of a nuclear Holocaust.”

Her warning came just as Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei defiantly rejected President Trump’s firm demand for unconditional denuclearization.

“The US President threatens us. With his absurd rhetoric, he demands that the Iranian people surrender to him,” Khamenei wrote on X. “The Iranian nation isn’t frightened by such threats.”

But the Biden-era appeasement strategy is long gone. Under Trump’s second term, the administration has made clear that Iranian belligerence will not go unchecked.

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) reinforced that view, posting on X, “The forever war is the war that Iran has waged against the U.S., Israel, and the civilized world since 1979.”

With tensions escalating and the Iran nuclear threat once again at the forefront, Tulsi Gabbard’s emotional message serves as both a reminder of the past and a warning about the future — one that must not be ignored.