The US this week conducted over 40 strikes across Yemeni territories — including the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa, the northern Sadaa governorate, and the Hodeidah Port — in what it called “precision strikes against Iran-backed Houthi targets”. US President Donald Trump, in a Truth Social post, addressed both the Houthis (Ansar Allah) and Iran, saying, “To all Houthi terrorists, your time is up and your attacks must stop…To Iran, support for Houthi terrorists must end immediately…” Two days later, Trump reiterated that the Houthi attacks “emanate from, and are created by Iran”, and declared that every shot being fired by the Houthis will be viewed as a shot fired from Iran, which would “suffer consequences”. The Houthis have responded with reciprocal escalatory rhetoric and claimed cruise and ballistic missile attacks on US warships in the Red Sea, including the USS Harry S Truman aircraft carrier and its strike group (the Houthis claimed three attacks on the carrier in 48 hours, on its Telegram channels). Why has Trump targeted the Houthis afresh? What are the group's ties with Iran, China, and Russia? What is the latest trigger for the US attack on Houthis? The Houthis’ casus belli is inextricably linked to the conflict in Gaza, which resumed in breach of the ceasefire on March 17, with a new Israeli military operation in Jabalia. Since December, 2023, Houthi attacks in the Red Sea have disrupted shipping lanes, causing ships to go around the Cape of Good Hope (all the way below Africa), and a meteoric rise in insurance premiums for those that have continued to sail through the Bab-el-Mandeb (effectively the link between the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean). The new anti-Houthi US operations reflect continuity in US policy. Former President Joe Biden had listed the Houthis as Specially Designated Global Terrorists in January 2024 (without re-designating them as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, or FTO) and the US Navy had begun leading Operation Prosperity Guardian in December 2023. The American casus belli was always linked to the disruption in global and US shipping. Countering such disruptions (and enforcing the freedom of navigation) has historically dominated the US Navy’s mandate. Trump’s Truth Social post reflected this rationale. Trump himself had designated the Houthis as an FTO in early 2021 and re-designated them as such in early 2025. But there is more to Trump’s new anti-Houthi focus. What are Trump’s objectives? While the United States has backed the Saudi-led coalition’s Operation Restoring Hope against the Houthis since 2015, the first Trump administration’s direct military action in Yemen did not overbearingly focus on the Houthis. The United States Central Command’s public announcements between 2017 and 2020 reflected a focus on striking Al Qaeda and Islamic State targets in Yemen, rather than Ansar Allah. The latter were a more insular group at the time, focused on the civil war and belligerent Arab states. The action in the Red Sea across the last 15 months has evidently changed this, drawing the United States in militarily. However, arguably, attacking the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen with a grand spectacle is also Trump’s way of avoiding direct escalation or full-blown war with Tehran, while signaling American compellence capabilities if Tehran does not negotiate on Trump’s terms in potential nuclear talks. Trump’s social media posts drive the Iran-linked objective home, increasing pressure on Tehran. Here, it is crucial to note that neither Trump’s social media posts nor the White House’s official statement declaring the airstrikes outline any anti-Houthi objectives beyond the need to halt attacks on Red Sea shipping. Moreover, the Arab states that were the principal external belligerents in Yemen since 2015 avoid supporting American anti-Houthi military action — a posture evident since January 2024 when Riyadh advised restraint to Washington. Some Saudi officials have even proactively denied any suspected logistical support to US military assets for their bombing runs in Yemen. How are the Houthis positioned? The Houthis are veterans of weathering operations that primarily rely on airstrikes. According to the Yemen Data Project, the group withstood at least 20,000 airstrikes from the Saudi-led coalition between 2015 and 2023. Moreover, apart from an art of war that relies heavily on mobility and small modular combat units, the Houthis have spent decades imbibing the lessons learnt by other groups such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah when fighting asymmetric wars against an adversary that can out-gun and out-spend. As Professor Jean-Loup Samaan of the UAE’s National Defense College also notes, the Houthis did not use missiles against their opponents until 2015, and even until then, the Houthi battlefield record was enviable, having survived at least six wars with the former Yemeni government of Ali Abdullah Saleh between 2004 and 2010. Like the Hezbollah’s 34-day missile barrage against Israel in the 2006 war despite the IDF’s intensive air campaign, the Houthis have moved to rely on a rocket, drone, and missile force since 2015. Hence, despite continued aerial bombardment by several foreign powers, including the United States, the Houthi yardstick of success has been the maintenance of operational capabilities. Given their continued drone and missile attacks on both military and commercial vessels, this capability evidently remains. Moreover, the degree of Iran’s control over the Houthis is not easily explained, despite Tehran being the group’s chief (but not exclusive) financier. Trump asserted that “Iran has played “the innocent victim” of rogue terrorists from which they’ve lost control, but they haven’t lost control.” While this implies Iran possibly having conveyed such claims in backchannel negotiations, Tehran has never made assertions of the Houthis going “rogue” publicly (apart from maintaining that Ansar Allah takes its decisions independently). In any case, the Houthis’ backers go beyond Iran, to Russia and China. Beijing’s significant purchases of Iranian oil (90% of all Iranian oil exports in 2024) has effectively made it an indirect financier of the Iran-Houthi channel according to the Atlantic Council, and both Russian and Chinese diplomatic and political support for the Houthis have allowed their ships to (largely) transit the Red Sea with fewer risks. Most of the anti-ship cruise missiles used by the Houthis are derivatives (to varying degrees) of old Chinese C-802 Saccade missile designs. Russia’s burgeoning ties with the Houthis have also been well evident, with greater interactions between Moscow and the group since the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. Russia now reportedly not only provides targeting intelligence to the group but is also considering greater small arms sales, along with newer anti-ship missiles. Consequently, as numerous American analysts too assess, sporadic US military actions alone will dent but not eliminate the Houthis’ offensive capabilities. Bashir Ali Abbas is a Senior Research Associate at the Council for Strategic and Defense Research, New Delhi
