United States strikes Houthis in Red Sea, EU to send three warships

The European Union wants to send at least three warships to safeguard vessels in the Red Sea facing attacks by Yemen's Houthi rebels.

The “new EU operation” was stated in a document from the European External Action Service to “act in a broader area of operation, from the Red Sea to the Gulf.”

The operation was mulled as the United States launched strikes on Thursday against Iran-backed Houthis rebels in Yemen, who have used drones and missiles to target ships in the Red Sea – one of the world’s busiest waterways – as a show of support for Palestinians under Israeli bombardment in Gaza.

The attacks have forced ships, which travel up the Red Sea to the Suez Canal, to take long detours around the Horn of Africa. Over 2,000 diverted thousands of miles to avoid the Red Sea, causing weeks of delays.

The United States and five of its allies on Thursday carried out military strikes against more than a dozen targets in Yemen controlled by Houthis, in an expansion of the war in the Middle East that the Biden administration had sought to avoid for the past three months.

The American-led air and naval strikes came in response to more than two dozen Houthi drone and missile attacks, and after warnings to the Houthis in the past week from the Biden administration of serious consequences if the salvos did not stop. On Tuesday, American and British warships intercepted one of the largest barrages of Houthi drone and missile strikes yet, an assault that U.S. and other Western military officials said was the last straw.

The strikes on Thursday hit radars, missile and drone launch sites, and weapons storage areas. Pentagon officials are still assessing whether the strikes were successful, emphasizing that they had sought to avoid any civilian casualties.

Britain joined the United States in the attack against the Houthi targets as fighter jets from bases in the region and off the aircraft carrier Dwight D. Eisenhower struck targets with precision-guided bombs. “The United Kingdom will always stand up for freedom of navigation and the free flow of trade,” Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said in a statement.

The Netherlands, Australia, Canada and Bahrain also participated, providing logistics, intelligence and other support, according to U.S. officials. At least one Navy submarine fired Tomahawk cruise missiles, the officials said.

In December, the US launched Operation Prosperity Guardian, an ad hoc coalition of some 13 partners. The EU runs its own anti-pirate mission, Atalanta, which operates in the Indian Ocean. The new EU mission would build on Agenor, a French-led joint surveillance operation covering the entire Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz and part of the Arabian Sea and which is composed of nine European countries (Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway and Portugal).

Thursday’s attack drew the United States more deeply into a conflict that ignited after Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October, killing 1,200. The Israeli response has so far killed more than 23,000 people in Gaza. The Gulf nations of Qatar and Oman have raised concerns that strikes against the Houthis could spiral out of control and drag the region into a wider war with other Iranian proxies, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon and Tehran-backed militias in Syria and Iraq.