The United States carried out a second round of strikes against Iran-backed Houthi rebel targets in Yemen early on Jan. 13, just a day after launching coordinated air strikes with international allies on 28 Houthi positions.
The fresh strikes come after the Houthi rebels fired at least one anti-ship ballistic missile into crucial international shipping lanes in the Red Sea on Jan. 12, according to a senior military official.
Army Lt. Gen. Douglas Sims, the director of operations for the Joint Staff, told reporters at a press briefing earlier on Jan. 12 that the missile fired “in retaliation” by Houthi rebels that day didn’t hit any ships.
“My guess is that the Houthis are trying to figure things out on the ground and trying to determine what capabilities still exist for them,” he said, noting that he expects that they'll try “some sort of retaliation.”
Lt. Gen. Sims indicated his hope that Iran would exert its “influence with the Houthis” to discourage further retaliatory actions.
“There are a number of actors here who have the ability and have influence with the Houthis who recognize that continued conflict ... is not advantageous to them. Iran would be one of them,” he said.
“As you know, the Iranians are directly, you know, connected to this, have been connected to the Houthis for quite some time, and we know that the Houthis listen to them. So the hope would be that any real thought of retaliation is based on a clear understanding that, you know, we simply are not going to be messed with here.”
This comes after the United States and the UK struck 28 different Houthi sites in Yemen on Jan. 11 in what the countries’ officials said was a bid to disrupt and degrade their ability to carry out attacks upon international shipping lanes in the Red Sea similar to the ones they’ve carried out since mid-November 2023.
He said the strike targets were located in sparsely populated areas and that a high number of casualties weren’t expected.
“This was not necessarily about casualties as much as it was about degrading capability [in terms of attacking] international shipping in the Red Sea, in the Bab-al-Mandeb,” Lt. Gen. Sims said.
The two countries were also backed by Canada, Australia, Bahrain, and the Netherlands in a nonoperational capacity on Jan. 11.
The Houthis have targeted commercial ships in the Red Sea since mid-November 2023, citing revenge against Israel for its Gaza campaign. A senior U.S. official rejected this justification for the attacks on the shipping channel on Jan. 11, asserting that the Houthi’s goal is to disrupt global trade.
“This is an issue about global commerce, the freedom of navigation, and threats to commercial vessels and international waterways,” the senior administration official said.
CENTCOM stated that the two strikes carried out this week “have no association with and are separate from Operation Prosperity Guardian, a defensive coalition of over 20 countries operating in the Red Sea, Bab al-Mandeb Strait, and Gulf of Aden.”
President Joe Biden issued a warning on Jan. 12 that the United States would take further military action in response to ongoing Houthi drone and missile attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea, labeling their behavior as outrageous.
“We will make sure we respond to the Houthis if they continue this outrageous behavior along with our allies,” President Biden said while in Pennsylvania.
