Kevin Drum makes a lot of sense today, and he's not even that well read on this specific issue. The Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen have been attacking Western shipping in the Red Sea. Over at National Review, Charles Cooke says we need to teach them a lesson: We’re trying to get on with our lives peacefully, and they’re interrupting it. And if the consequence of us dealing with it is that they escalate it, then we escalate it further until we blow them out of the water. It’s just very simple. This is statecraft 101. Well, maybe not quite so simple. Most of the Houthi attacks are coming from ground-based drones and missiles, not ships on the sea. We're trying to destroy this capability, but it's virtually impossible to get it done solely via air attacks. To truly eliminate the threat you have to eliminate the Houthis, and that means boots on the ground. And even that might not work. After all, Saudi Arabia has been fighting the Houthis for close to a decade with no apparent effect. The Houthis continued lobbing missiles into the Kingdom the entire time until a precarious truce was negotiated in 2022. The Saudis never even came close to destroying Houthi missile capability. This is the problem with the default conservative position on war, which is basically "Hulk smash." It sounds good, but even the US has limits. We can't escalate every conflict infinitely, and the last couple of decades have surely taught us that even when we try it doesn't always work. Who runs Afghanistan these days after 20 years of American war and 2,400 American dead? Should we declare all-out war on the Houthis? - Kevin Drum
They found a vulnerability, likely because it was in Jordan. Maybe we didn't consider that a likely target. Either way, the war we've been trying to avoid is being thrust upon us. Too bad there's not a way to avoid it because it's hard to imagine it ends well for us in terms of our overall strategic goals. It may have been the Republican Guard acting rogue but it doesn't matter. It happened
I know this base well. The unit I came from before school has people there right now. Waiting to hear if it was any of them.
There’s a phrase nobody in or intimately involved with kinetic operations ever says. “ was our response proportional?” Stunningly naive and exceptionally dangerous
they need to hurt the IGRC and quit playing whack a mole with the proxy of the day. it doesn't need to be spectacular, just efficient. plausible deniability isn't a bad thing imo
No, but it is something with which civilian policy makers need to be concerned. And they should be as emotionally detached as possible when considering responses. When you do something just to do something, you get what happened after that suicide bombing at HKIA during the strategic retreat from Afghanistan. We “struck back” in a manner that I thought was awfully fast (since I’ve seen in previous cases that it usually takes a lot longer to build up an intelligence and strike package) and “called it even,” just to learn we killed a humanitarian aid worker who delivered water around Kabul. Jake Sullivan et al felt real good about delivering swift justice until the smoke cleared. Newly Declassified Video Shows U.S. Killing of 10 Civilians in Drone Strike (Published 2022).
100% agreement. When you do something to do it it’s usually a poor choice. Tactically and strategically. I was referencing being the guy on the ground….on the receiving end of bad guys doing bad guys things, then getting knee capped and tasked with sending a ‘proportional response’. Of course that order was originated from someone 6,000 miles away
I have to agree. There has been a fair amount of failed appeasement toward Iran in this administration, especially in 2021 through roughly summer 2022, but I cannot think of any examples since October 7th.
Isn't it normalization that got us here? If you don't hit back and hit back hard, they'll just keep doing it. While I agree Iran wants American troops involved, I'm not sure how that accomplishes much for their overall agenda. I mean, don't we already have huge bases and large amounts of troops in Jordan, Qatar, several other spots in the region? Yes, I realize we aren't returning fire for the most part, but the allowance of small attacks here and there is likely what led us to this point. Iran testing how far they can push us. I don't think the rest of the ME is going to turn on the U.S. if we carry out justice.
Part of the problem. The administration is going to be forced to do a complete about face and that has its own risks at home politically. Frankly, I don't think Biden/Sullivan will do much about this and it will be left to Herr Trump to lay the hammer down. Many around Biden consider him a lame duck already, whether they admit to it or not.
