Business Leaders React to the US Strike on Iran’s Nuclear Sites

President Donald Trump on Saturday confirmed that US warplanes had executed “massive precision” airstrikes on three Iranian nuclear sites, in what he described in a press conference as a “spectacular military success.”

The military operation marks a significant escalation in the tensions between Iran and Israel and represents a new level of US involvement in the international conflict.

Business leaders from Bill Ackman to Jason Calacanis reacted to the news.

Bill Ackman

Billionaire hedge fund manager Ackman, a longtime ally of the president’s, was among the first to publicly react to the news with a post on X.

“Thank you to our great military for its superb execution on ridding Iran of its nuclear threat,” Ackman wrote shortly after the news broke. “All Americans are eternally grateful for you.”

He continued later, writing in a separate post: “To state the obvious, @realDonaldTrump’s actions tonight are a lot better than relying on the IRGC’s ‘commitment’ to not develop nuclear weapons.”

Jason Calacanis

Serial entrepreneur Calacanis posted on X, “Five months into Trump’s term, we’re at war.”

In a subsequent post, he elaborated, saying that his initial statement was “just an observation, published without judgement.”

“We don’t have the intelligence that our leaders have, so I will reserve judgement until we know more,” Calacanis wrote. “It should be obvious to everyone, however, that no president can just stop conflicts on day one. We now have three conflicts were involved in.”

Spencer Hakimian

The founder of the hedge fund Tolou Capital Management responded to the strikes in a series of posts on social media, describing the US military operation as “completely undetectable,” given that no flight trackers showed US military aircraft over Iran within 30 minutes of the strikes.

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“Say what you want,” Hakimian wrote. “The United States military is A1 and there’s not a close competitor at the moment.”

In a separate post, Hakimian added: “The most escalatory thing that Iran can do is not to bomb U.S. military bases in the Middle East. It’s to close the Strait of Hormuz. And if that happens, Oil goes above $100 in the blink of an eye. Iran is no military match for the United States. But they can wreak havoc via inflation. Just like Russia in 2022.”

Shaun Maguire

Maguire, a partner at Sequoia Capital, praised Trump as the “Greatest President of my lifetime.”

“You may just not realize it yet,” Maguire wrote in a post on X, alongside a picture of Trump with his fist in the air after he was wounded during an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania. “Bulletproof instincts and nerves of steel.”

James Fishback

A vocal supporter of Trump and cofounder of Azoria investment firm, Fishback praised the US strikes — and criticized those who expressed concern over the rising geopolitical tensions — in a series of posts on X.

“Iran can’t possibly think this is the start of a U.S. offensive. Trump’s been clear from the start: they can’t have a nuke. We just accomplished that. We’re done here,” Fishback said in one post. “If Iran chooses to retaliate against a clearly telegraphed, one-and-done strike, they’d be signing their own death warrant. Trump was right.”

In a separate post, he added: “The Fordow nuclear site was a uranium enrichment facility, not a mosque. Not everything is Islamophobia. Calm down. Leave your weird identity politics out of this.”