{"id":69822,"date":"2025-04-02T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-04-02T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2025\/04\/02\/how-trumps-team-flipped-on-bombing-the-houthis\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T01:19:54","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T01:19:54","slug":"how-trumps-team-flipped-on-bombing-the-houthis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/pentagon\/2025\/04\/02\/how-trumps-team-flipped-on-bombing-the-houthis\/","title":{"rendered":"How Trump\u2019s team flipped on bombing the Houthis"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Before the Trump administration began striking targets across Yemen to reopen global shipping, before many of its top officials included a journalist on a group chat to plan those strikes, in fact even before Donald Trump took office this January, many in his administration didn\u2019t think attacking the Houthis was such a good idea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are burning readiness to the tune of tens of billions of dollars for what really amounts to a ragtag bunch of terrorists that are Iran proxies,\u201d then-Rep. Mike Waltz, now the president\u2019s national security advisor, told Politico last year<\/a>. \u201cIran is the core of the issue.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s truly a mark of how off-kilter our foreign policy is that we are now embarking on ongoing military attacks in Yemen – Yemen! – without any real prospect they will be effective,\u201d Elbridge Colby, nominated to run Pentagon policy, posted on the social media site X last year.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since the group chat on the commercial messaging app Signal became public last week, the Trump administration has argued the scandal only distracts from the \u201chighly successful\u201d airstrikes it began earlier in March. Even more, it\u2019s framed the campaign as a return to American strength after years of \u201cdeferred maintenance\u201d under the Biden administration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But as some of the officials\u2019 past statements show, the airstrike campaign shows a change in how some members of the Trump administration see the Middle East, and America\u2019s interests there. The strikes have certainly escalated since last year, experts said. But they represent a high degree of continuity with the Biden administration\u2019s strategy \u2014 and are likely to encounter the same problems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhether we\u2019re going to make the Houthis cry for mercy anytime soon is extremely unlikely,\u201d said Michael Knights, an analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A \u2018relentless\u2019 campaign<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

The most recent attacks in Yemen began March 15, when U.S. Central Command hit 30 targets across Yemen belonging to the Houthis, a terrorist group largely sustained by Iran. Immediately, the administration sought to distinguish these attacks from its predecessor\u2019s approach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cJoe Biden\u2019s response was pathetically weak, so the unrestrained Houthis just kept going,\u201d Trump posted on his Truth Social app shortly after the attacks began.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shortly after Israel\u2019s war in Gaza began in the fall of 2023, the Houthis began attacking commercial ships passing through the Red Sea, where 15% of global trade passed until that year.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In response, the U.S. and a group of other countries began a task force intended to protect those shipping lanes. The American military sent aircraft carriers, destroyers and other ships into the Red Sea to escort vessels, and also began routine airstrikes against Houthi sites in Yemen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The problem, officials in the Biden Pentagon later acknowledged, was that these strikes didn\u2019t solve the root issue. Even when attacked, the Houthis could resupply their stockpiles with support from Iran, and the group was gaining prestige by continuing its salvos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOne thing we learned from our experience is not to underestimate the Houthis\u2019 resilience,\u201d said Daniel Shapiro, head of Pentagon Middle East policy until January, who supports the current airstrike campaign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Trump administration\u2019s answer has been to hit harder. It\u2019s conducted more than 100 strikes across Yemen so far, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said last week, and it\u2019s changed the targets. Whereas the former administration stuck mostly to military sites \u2014 think ammunition depots or launch zones \u2014 this one is much more willing to hit enemy leaders, including those closer to civilians in urban areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have destroyed command-and-control facilities, air defense systems, weapons manufacturing facilities and advanced weapons storage locations. While the Houthis still maintain capability, it is largely because of the nearly 10 years of support provided by Iran,\u201d a U.S. defense official said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These attacks have been occurring much faster than the former campaign. And they\u2019re taking place alongside a greater effort to inspect ships entering Yemen for equipment meant to resupply the Houthis, potentially slowing the group\u2019s recovery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis campaign will be relentless to degrade their capability and to open up shipping lanes in the region,\u201d Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said in a March 17 briefing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Surge pricing<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

Still, outside experts say those lanes will likely stay closed for months, if not indefinitely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shipping companies have almost uniformly chosen to reroute around the Red Sea, reasoning that it\u2019s more important for a ship to arrive safely than quickly. Doing so has actually increased their revenue, which will make it harder for any country to force a return to the status quo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Houthis have reshaped global shipping, and they\u2019ve done so in a way that\u2019s more profitable for global shipping,\u201d Knights said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The other issue is that the Houthis have been here before. In fact, the group has been in a state of almost-constant war for the last 20 years \u2014 against Saudi Arabia, the Yemeni government, the United Arab Emirates and now the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe problem with the air war there is that it\u2019s not going to work,\u201d said Ben Friedman, an analyst at Defense Priorities, a think tank that calls for a more restrained U.S. foreign policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Houthis began their attacks again March 11, after a short pause following a ceasefire in Gaza. An easier way to stop their attacks may be to pressure Israel to allow more humanitarian aid to reach the Palestinian people, Friedman argued, though U.S. officials are wary of making it seem like the Houthis are fighting a noble cause by attacking commercial ships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, the administration has continued to escalate the military campaign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last week it extended the deployment the Harry S Truman carrier strike group already in the Red Sea and announced it would bring over another one from the Indo-Pacific<\/a>, leading to a few weeks of overlap before the Truman departs. It has also brought over additional B-2 stealth bombers and scarce air defense batteries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the meantime the airstrikes continue, including rounds over the weekend that pummeled areas across Yemen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe hit them every day and night \u2014 Harder and harder,\u201d Trump posted Monday<\/a>, again threatening Iran if it continued supporting the group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Red Sea has not reopened for shipping companies, and the military surge has many Democrats in Congress concerned about the mixture of means and ends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey\u2019re aware that this will have costs for readiness,\u201d said a Democratic congressional aide, speaking anonymously per the office\u2019s policy, of the Pentagon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The critique may sound like the sort of partisan grandstanding that often occurs in Washington. But last year, it wasn\u2019t an entirely Democratic issue \u2014 at least for Waltz.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re using a lot of munitions,\u201d the then-representative said at a March 2024 hearing, describing the Biden administration\u2019s strategy. \u201cWe\u2019re burning readiness.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cWhether we\u2019re going to make the Houthis cry for mercy anytime soon is extremely unlikely,\u201d one expert on Yemen 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