What makes you think the Iranians weren’t working on this with the Chinese. And the Iranians or at least the mullahs and their followers, are believers in end times and this could be part of that.
Totally agree wrt the terrorism angle.
Also rumored that Iran got ‘eaten up with it’ early on because of the back and forth between there and China helping develop nuclear weapons.
If true, means their nuclear scientists might be pining for the fjords. So there might be an upside here.
It’s certainly possible.
But a lab accident strikes me as most likely.