US Destroys Houthi Targets Amid More Attacks In Red Sea
The US military conducted four operations from Wednesday afternoon until early Thursday local time, targeting Houthi drone control stations and shooting down several Iran-made drones.
The US military conducted four operations from Wednesday afternoon until early Thursday local time, targeting Houthi drone control stations and shooting down several Iran-made drones.
The first operation destroyed a Houthi surface-to-air missile as it was preparing to launch. In the second operation, a missile and three Iran-made drones were shot down as they approached the USS Carney. A few hours later, another operation targeted a Houthi control station along with 10 'suicide drones' on the ground.
The US Central Command issued three statements in less than ten hours, stating that all the operations were carried out in self-defense because the drones posed an imminent threat to merchant vessels and US Navy ships in the region.
Earlier, a spokesman for the Houthis had claimed an attack on the US merchant ship “KOI” in the Gulf of Aden. CENTCOM confirmed this report, adding that USS Carney had shot down three Iranian drones and one anti-ship ballistic missile launched from Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen.
The uptick in hostilities at the Red Sea comes at a time when the the Biden administration is weighing its options for attacking Iran, in response to last weekend’s drone attack on a US base in Jordan, which killed three American soldiers and wounded dozens.
An Iranian proxy militant group in Iraq, Kataib Hezbollah, responsible for the attack on US troops in Jordan, announced a halt to further operations against US targets, but the Houthi forces have vowed to continue attacks on US and British warships, as well as commercial vessels.
President Biden announced on Tuesday that he has made a decision regarding the response, but no strikes have been launched, and no official details have been shared.
Wednesday evening, NBC News reported that the retaliation against Iran-backed militants could last for “weeks.” Quoting US officials, the news channel claimed that the targets may include Iranian interests outside Iran.
The Biden administration is under growing pressure to retaliate. But ‘retaliation without escalation’ (Biden’s preferred option) seems hard to accomplish. Soon, it will be a week since the killing of American soldiers. At the Capitol, patience is running out.
“[Iran] should be hit, and it should be hit hard,” Democratic Senator John Fetterman told Iran International’s Arash Alaei Wednesday. “Any nation that’s underwriting terrorism across that region has to be punished. But that doesn’t mean it has to be attacked directly.”
Iranian officials say their allied armed groups are independent and often leave Tehran in the dark. But many in Washington blame Iran for most –if not all– attacks against the US and its allies. However, Houthis attacks on commercial vessels began in mid-November after Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei urged Muslim nations to blockade Israeli ports.
Iran and its proxies have launched more than 160 strikes against US forces in Syria and Iraq since October. And Houthis in Yemen have managed to disrupt shipping in the Red Sea with their regular attacks on commercial vessels and even US warships.
The Houthis say their attacks are in response to the Israeli onslaught in Gaza and should thus concern only the ships with some connection to Israel. In reality, however, several ships with no discernible ties to Israel have been targeted.
It’s unclear if President Biden’s avowed retaliatory ‘campaign’ –if and when it happens– would replace the existing operation against the Houthis. Either way, judging by their relentless attacks on commercial vessels in spite of US (and UK) airstrikes in the past few weeks, the Houthis seem to not really care.
“Key to Israel’s—and the region’s—security is dealing with Iran,” wrote William J. Burns in an article called Spycraft and Statecraft in Foreign Affairs.
The US spy chief said the Hamas atrocities of October 7, which has sparked Iran’s proxies across the region to ignite, has only empowered Iran, worsened by a weak US leadership.
“The Iranian regime has been emboldened by the [Gaza] crisis and seems ready to fight to its last regional proxy, all while expanding its nuclear program and enabling Russian aggression,” the spy chief wrote.
“In the months after October 7, the Houthis, the Yemeni rebel group allied with Iran, began attacking commercial ships in the Red Sea, and the risks of escalation on other fronts persist,” he said.
However, with more than 160 attacks by the proxies on US facilities and personnel since the Gaza war broke out, and just a handful of military responses from Washington, there has been little deterrence, he admitted.
“The United States is not exclusively responsible for resolving any of the Middle East’s vexing problems. But none of them can be managed, let alone solved, without active US leadership.”
He said the ensuing “crisis precipitated by Hamas’s butchery … is a painful reminder of the complexity of the choices that the Middle East continues to pose for the United States”.
While competition with China will remain Washington’s highest priority, the Middle East has now reared its head, at a time when Biden has done his utmost to avoid conflict and attempted to pull away from the region.
The withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan in 2021 was a disaster leaving a more emboldened Taliban in charge, and the refusal to deal more strongly with Iran has seen hostages exchanged for billions of dollars yet the regime continues to bolster its nuclear program in spite of global sanctions.
“I have spent much of the last four decades working in and on the Middle East, and I have rarely seen it more tangled or explosive,” he warned. “Winding down the intense Israeli ground operation in the Gaza Strip, meeting the deep humanitarian needs of suffering Palestinian civilians, freeing hostages, preventing the spread of conflict to other fronts in the region, and shaping a workable approach for the “day after” in Gaza are all incredibly difficult problems.”
Beyond the Middle East, Iran continues to inflame the fans of conflict elsewhere, including its assistance to Russia in its unending war on Ukraine. “This year is likely to be a tough one on the battlefield in Ukraine, a test of staying power whose consequences will go well beyond the country’s heroic struggle to sustain its freedom and independence,” he warned, the war now entering its third year.
Iran has become a key ally, supplying the likes of drones used on civilian populations as the two sanctioned nations grow ever closer. “As Putin regenerates Russia’s defense production—with critical components from China, as well as weaponry and munitions from Iran and North Korea—he continues to bet that time is on his side, that he can grind down Ukraine and wear down its Western supporters,” added Burns.