Yes, it could have been considered an act of war, and have caused major issues. There's a parliamentary commission that's responsible for controlling the Dutch intelligence services, consisting out of the leaders of the 5 biggest parties in parliament. The fact that they weren't informed is a scandal.
> Nice to see that European intelligence services are still capable of something
I don't think the AIVD has been criticized for being ineffective, if anything the other way around.
reputation, carefully curated, is that they're small but can punch above their weight.
they watched the Russians hack the US Democrats in real time, for example. that's how we know Guccifer was the Russians -- Dutch intel was already on those systems. Woulda been nice if they stopped them, but you don't become an APT by intervening constantly or blowing 0-days willy-nilly, and the attribution was useful enough.
A former head of the intelligence department is quoted that not briefing the PM is more or less default ("sweeping his sidewalk"), which is an insult to democracy. Not that I cannot see the rationale for this action, but it all falls under the broad perversions of democracy and justice that our former-PM (Rutte) has willfully accepted.
In a proper functioning democracy at least the prime minister should know what intelligence services are up to. As those politicians are ultimately responsible. It’s not that intelligence services are independent lawless sub-states.
Better source: https://www.volkskrant.nl/nieuws-achtergrond/politiek-ontste...
Unless you are the Iranian state I guess.
It also hit much wider than just Iran's centrifuges.
Infected computers by country:
Iran 58.9%
Indonesia 18.2%
India 8.3%
Azerbaijan 2.6%
United States 1.6%
Pakistan 1.3%
Other countries 9.2%
Iran funds, plans and executes terrorist attacks around the world, including Europe and the United States (via proxy organizations, and it also mostly fails, which is nice).
Iran supplies Russia with drones for its war with Ukraine (obviously this is after Stuxnet, but just pointing out they are aligned with Russia/China against the West).
Iran openly calls for the destruction of the United States and Israel (can you guess where its future nuclear weapons will be pointed at?).
How is it not okay for the United States and Israel to sabotage their nuclear program? How is it equivalent to sabotaging the UK?
How does Iran call for destruction of US? And why?
How many have Iran killed? The war on terror alone have caused more than 500.000 deaths. Sure you can say Iran is evil, but nothing you said makes them an okay target more than the US, UK, EU, etc.
Sounds like Murican propaganda to me.
Whats next? Russia's mass murder Nuclear program?
We should form a rainbow-color coalition, invade on your premise, wage an unwinnable war for 20 years, and then ditch everything when it's apparent Western values are not welcomed by the local guerrilla.