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According to the NYT coverage Stuxnet was never intended to spread beyond Natanz. The escape led to the worm's discovery by security researchers, which led to the investigation and revelation of the US's involvement.

I would say that because it spread beyond Natanz it was a big fuck up :)

Yeah, but everyone knows we don't want them to get nukes. The rest of the world doesn't want them to get nukes. Iran would have discovered the highly specialized virus on their network. It was a fuck up that the media got confirmation of the virus creators, but everyone knew who was behind it from day one.

No, everyone did not know. Many had strong suspicions.

Only did it though?

The evidence is VERY circumstantial to most nuclear engineering professionals I would think. I think you want them taken out, not vandalized.

IIRC, it was supposed to put Iran's nuclear program behind by several years, but because it escaped into the wild---and thus endured far greater public scrutiny than it would have otherwise---the Iranians found out about it much earlier than they were intended to, so it didn't have quite the impact that the US/Israel were hoping for.