The immediate consequences of U.S./U.K. military action in Yemen shouldn’t surprise anyone. Just as opponents of the strikes said, attacking the Houthis has made the threat to commercial shipping worse:
The US and UK’s decision to hit back at Houthi militants after weeks of attacks on merchant shipping in the Red Sea has only escalated the chaos across the shipping industry, underscoring the threat of an enduring supply-chain crisis as vessels navigate the crucial trade route.
Not only has escalating against the Houthis failed to stop the attacks on shipping as predicted, but the Houthis have been having more success in hitting their targets in the last week than they had before the U.S. and Britain attacked them. The Houthis have not yet started targeting U.S. bases and personnel elsewhere in the region, but it may just be a matter of time before they do. The U.S. chose to escalate a nuisance into a fight. Washington is not going to get what it wants with more threats and airstrikes, but those seem to be the only tools that this administration knows how to use.
The Houthis have thrived on conflict and have few incentives to back down. Confronting the U.S. raises their profile and increases their popularity. U.S. and British strikes can weaken Houthi capabilities, but they cannot end the threat to shipping. That threat will remain as long as the war in Gaza continues. The U.S. and British governments can pretend that there is no connection between the two things all they like, but it will get them no closer to solving the problem.
The administration’s other recent reckless and destructive move – re-designating the Houthis as specially designated global terrorists – isn’t going to help matters. The AP reported yesterday on how the designation is likely to play into the Houthis’ hands politically:
Hisham Al-Omeisy, a Yemeni analyst living in the Washington, area, said the U.S. designation plays into the Houthis’ narrative to the world that they are standing up to a superpower to champion Muslims everywhere.
At home, the designation helps the Houthis’ message to Yemenis that the U.S. is the cause of their suffering, Al-Omeisy said.
Read the rest of the article at Eunomia
Daniel Larison is a contributing editor for Antiwar.com and maintains his own site at Eunomia. He is former senior editor at The American Conservative. He has been published in the New York Times Book Review, Dallas Morning News, World Politics Review, Politico Magazine, Orthodox Life, Front Porch Republic, The American Scene, and Culture11, and was a columnist for The Week. He holds a PhD in history from the University of Chicago, and resides in Lancaster, PA. Follow him on Twitter.
