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The United States and Britain on Monday carried out large-scale military strikes on eight locations in Yemen controlled by Houthi militants, the two countries said. The strikes signaled that the Biden administration plans to wage a sustained and, at least for now, open-ended campaign against the Iran-backed group that has disrupted traffic on vital international shipping lanes.
The strikes – the eighth in nearly two weeks – hit multiple targets in each location, and were larger and broader than a recent series of more limited attacks on individual Houthi missiles that the Americans say emerged at short notice. Those missiles were hit before they could be fired at ships in the Red Sea or Gulf of Aden.
But Monday's planned nighttime strikes, which hit radars, drone and missile sites and underground weapons storage bunkers, were smaller than the first retaliatory salvos on January 11. They hit more than 60 targets in nearly 30 locations in Yemen, in an extension of the conflict in the Middle East that the Biden administration had tried to avoid.
This middle ground reflects the administration's attempt to undermine the Houthis' ability to threaten merchant and military vessels, but not strike so hard as to kill large numbers of Houthi fighters and commanders, and potentially unleash even more chaos in a region that is already tottering. the edge of a wider war.
“Let us reiterate our warning to the Houthi leadership: we will not hesitate to defend lives and the free flow of commerce in one of the world's most critical waterways in the face of the continued threat,” the US and British governments said in a statement declaration.
They were joined in the statement by the Netherlands, Australia, Canada and Bahrain, which, as in the Jan. 11 strikes, also participated and provided logistical, intelligence and other support, U.S. officials said.
All told, however, the US-led strikes, in an operation the military is calling Poseidon Archer, have so far failed to deter the Houthis from attacking shipping lanes to and from the Suez Canal that are crucial for world trade. The Iran-backed group says it will continue its attacks in what it says is a protest against Israel's military campaign in Gaza against Hamas.
The Houthis remained defiant even on Monday following attacks by carrier-based Navy FA-18 fighter jets, Tomahawk cruise missiles and British Typhoon fighter jets. “Retaliation against US and British attacks is inevitable, and any new aggression will not go unpunished,” Houthi military spokesman Yahya Sarea said in a statement ahead of the latest US strikes.
The Houthis claimed on Monday to have attacked a US military cargo ship, Ocean Jazz, in the Gulf of Aden, but the White House and Pentagon denied such an attack had taken place.
President Biden said on Thursday that US airstrikes against the Houthis would continue. “Are they stopping the Houthis? No,” Mr. Biden said. “Are they going to continue? Yes.”
On Sunday, Jon Finer, a deputy national security adviser, offered a glimpse into the administration's emerging strategy toward the Houthis that had been forged during several high-level meetings at the White House in recent days, senior U.S. officials said.
“They have stockpiles of advanced weapons that Iran has in many cases made available to them or in many cases enabled them to do,” Mr. Finer said on ABC News' “This Week.” “We're removing these supplies so they can't carry out as many attacks over time. That will take time to play out.”
American-led air and naval attacks began in response more than twenty Houthi drone and missile attacks against commercial shipping in the Red Sea since November. The government and several allies had repeatedly warned the Houthis of dire consequences if the volleys did not stop.
But two US officials warned a few days after the air campaign began that despite hitting more Houthi missile and drone targets with more than 150 precision-guided munitions, the strikes had damaged or destroyed the skies. only about 20 to 30 percent of the Houthis' offensive capabilitymany of which are mounted on mobile platforms and can be easily moved or hidden.
A third senior official said on Monday that figure may have risen to 30 to 40 percent after at least 25 to 30 precision-guided munitions successfully hit their targets on Monday. But other US intelligence officials briefed on the size and scope of the Houthis' arsenal say analysts are unsure how many weapons the group has started with.
U.S. and other Western intelligence agencies have not spent much time or resources in recent years collecting data on the location of Houthi air defenses, command centers, ammunition depots and storage and production facilities for drones and missiles, the officials said.
That changed quickly after the Hamas attacks in Israel on October 7 and the Houthi attacks on commercial ships a month later. U.S. analysts are rushing every day to catalog more potential Houthi targets, the officials said. That effort captured many of the targets hit on Jan. 11 and Monday, officials said.
Many Republicans in Congress and some former senior U.S. military officials say this approach isn't working.
“The key is we have to damage the Houthis enough that they will stop,” Gen. Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr., a retired head of the military's Central Command, said in an interview. “We haven't done that yet.”
Vivian Nereim contributed reporting from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.