A national security expert and former US Air Force special operations commander says the risk of Iran-affiliated terrorist groups going nuclear should be considered by the US.

Glenn Ignazio told Today a US strike on Iran’s Fordow nuclear enrichment facility would be a “surgical” and “tactical” attack.

Any US involvement in the current conflict, he said, would likely be focused on that one manoeuvre.

“Yet the definition of ‘war’ is getting momentum, and people have to understand the difference,” he said.

“No ground troops, there’s no war planned. It’s this particular event.”

And Ignazio said he backed US involvement – though maybe not for the reasons previously touted by US hawks.

“People are saying, are (Iran) going to really strike somebody else? It’s not really that worry,” he said.

“I think it’s proliferation of their terrorist factions that really concerns me, of a nuclear capability getting out.

“So the idea of shutting this not just now, but forever, that’s where I sit on it, that I think it needs to be done.”

Recent US intelligence, which has been brushed aside by both the Israeli government and Trump, indicated Iran was not close to producing a nuclear weapon.