The United States has already committed to a months-long campaign to force an end to Houthi attacks in the Red Sea, continuing to conduct attacks this week to degrade the Houthis’ missile arsenal. This exercise in futility will not deliver its desired end and will instead make attacks like those in Iraq last week more likely. Though no American service members were fatalities in last week’s attack, the overwhelming force and resultant injuries portend a cycle of escalation where this possibility becomes an inevitability.
The United States has to look at its options to secure shipping in the Red Sea. This means changing either the Houthis’ strategic calculus or their ability to attack shipping. In practice, nine years of Saudi bombings against the Houthis shows that the latter cannot be accomplished.
Whether through disbursement, camouflage or replacement, the Houthis’ missile arsenal is redundant and unlikely to be bombed into irrelevance. Precision bombs did not help the Saudis then, and they won’t help Washington now.
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