Been talking with folks at work about this for a while. We used to board and confiscate Iranian weapons off dozens of dhows - haven't seen anything recently. Yemen is tiny and only has a few suitable ports. It should not be that hard to cut off the incoming weapons. Issue some letters of marque, station mercs on uparmored barges outside the ports and have them inspect every single inbound vessel. No impact on aid, food, etc - but starve the weapon supply. It'd be so much cheaper and more efficient than wasting our ordnance.
USCG. Call the boardings safety checks. Back up the cutters with bigger ships with guns. Oh, wait. The Navy is too modern and sophisticated to have ships with guns. Sometimes low tech is better tech. One of the billets I had in the latter stages of my career was OinC ShipRepairDet Bahrain. Pre-Grulf War I, one of the periodic tasks we had was installing Hughes chainguns on pre-installed foundations of destroyers, for their trip thru the Bab El-Mandeb. One solution only, and may not be teh best these days.
[Funny story about that. The contractor assigned to do the installation on one ship was a one-man operation, so I went along, dressed in my very low-key uniform of the day - jeans, polo shirt, tennis shoes - and started turning wrenches. The GMC and his crew just stood around and watched until the contractor called me "Commander", at which point we had all the help we could ever want.]
USCG does have training for stuff like this, but I think this is the sort of situation that becomes cheaper and more efficient by outsourcing it professionally (like the security teams on the tankers during the somalia piracy raids) - and maybe keeping a small det there for comms/etc. (most would probably be former SOF/SEALS/etc anyways).
While I generally agree with your gist, Yemen is not "tiny" its 80% the size of Afghanistan and approximately 7 times the size of South Vietnam, countries we occupied and still couldn't control.
The problem is not "their "ports". They are an insurgent group not a conventional military. They rely on a long established and resilient smuggling network to meet their needs. Most likely very little of these weapons arrives in Yemen in a single piece on anything larger than a 30 foot boat. One can go on google earth and see many places such boats just pull up on shore in Yemen. Their routes involve Oman, Somalia, Eritrea, Sudan and other countries further abroad.
The solution to this problem is interdiction on the seas and disruption of nodes outside Yemen at the granular level - the level at which Houthi and Iranian smuggling operates. Sadly our military does nothing granular, it wants to do it all in 100000 ton ship loads and that's what its suited for, worst of all the Navy. The preponderance of resources in our Navy flows uphill to the CBG fort and only then do the leftover scraps get to roll down hill to the peasants.
So we will stupidly park a CBG off one of the poorest countries on the planet for extended times and put on a demo for our adversaries to use to figure out all our weaknesses, capabilities, capacities, gaps, tolerances, behaviors etc., etc., while wasting vast amounts of munitions and stressing our forces while we drop bombs on the mushrooms as they pop up without ever starving the mycelium.
And we wonder why we keep doing the same dumb stuff and losing. When we go to war with China we'll probably be shocked at all the glitches that suddenly happen just before the shooting starts. Does anyone really think the Solong t-boned a US contracted ship by accident?
Continuing my above comment because I didn't realize Substack truncated comments without notice:
Last year the Houthis did about 100 attacks on commercial shipping. Assuming each attack averaged 5 weapons (drone, missiles) and the weapons averaged 2 tons each in total system weight per shot that's 1000 tons. 1000/365 = 2.73 tons per day. That's it, that's all the Houthis have to smuggle in per day to globally disrupt shipping. 3 little boats worth. 3 F-150 loads.
We'll know the country has learned its lessons when an ARG full of boats, helicopters smaller than an airliner, UAVs, USVs and Marines actually trained to do maritime tasks instead of Incheon 2.0 arrives in the Red Sea or better yet the Persian Gulf, until then its whack-a-shroom with a 50lb sledge hammers.
Haven't looked up the exact numbers of weapons/commercial attacks, but when they attack the current CSG (going back to IKE right after 7 Oct) - they use a LOT more weapons per attack and significantly larger ones.
Even if they used 3 times as many weapons in a year, that's still less than 10 small boat/truck loads per day along 1500 miles of coast and 1100 miles of border.
Secondly their leverage derives from them having the option to attack commercial shipping at will. The Houthi are almost certainly essentially operating as a nonprofit who's donors (including Russia) are those who want to distract the US and/or Israel. They are not pirates and thinking of them as such is a strategic error as bad as believing the Vietnamese were driven by communism more than nationalism. So long as we deploy a CSG on the mere threat of the Houthi attacking commercial shipping, the Houthi's donors are essentially puppeteering US nation policy for their gain. Its therefore the weapons fired at commercial ships that matter most strategically.
A CSG in the Red Sea is a CSG that's not ready for action against Iran or other actors. Its a CSG whos weapons load can be diminished. Its then only 1 or 2 disabled USNS ship (reference the Stena Immaculate) from degradation. Its the minimal number of weapons needed to disrupt commercial shipping that gives them the escalatory power to control US actions. The rest of the weapons just demonstrate will. Reacting this way is idiocy. The same idiocy we have engaged in since at least 2001.
Regarding the remarks by the UN Secretary-General: I feel bad for the innocent Yemenis, of which there are undoubtedly some, but why should the United States care more about what happens to them than their countrymen do? It was the Houthis who started this party, after all.
Further, if the UN actually wants stability and a cessation of the humanitarian crisis, then the Yemeni Civil War needs to end, part of ending said war is the defeat of the Houthi movement, and keeping the Houthis from funding themselves via extortion would go a long way towards that goal.
("But what about negotiating a settlement?" I hear a Peace Studies major plaintively cry. Well, that would be better than resolving the issue via bloodshed, but as long as the Iranians are supplying them and want to keep things going, the Houthis have no reason to negotiate unless they are decisively defeated on the battlefield.)
CDR Sal, you're on a roll, keep rollin'...(-; Viewed thru the reductionist lens of "you get more of what you reward, and less of what you punish" the campaign you describe has been obvious for years. Years ago, when kidnapping and ransoming diplomats was on the rise, when Russian diplomats were kidnapped, the violent response of the Russian security services convinced the kidnappers to leave Russian diplomats alone. Took us a while (and a new administration) to learn the same lesson. The Biden administration had reasons for acting the way they did towards the Houthis as they choked off the Red Sea. The new administration does not share those reasons, hence, the enactment of the Salamander doctrine is underway. What you describe is the William Tecumseh Sherman approach to war...it's hell, understand that, embrace it, apply force to bring the message home to the government AND the populace, and you may, repeat may, shorten the violence. Stretching things out, "proportional response" only serve to keep the violence going...that is guaranteed, and the opposite of "humanitarian". Very strange that.
"Do we have an understanding at the highest levels of government what is actually required to win against hostiles such as the Houthi?" The question should be do we understand the concept of winning.
Another point needs to be, as we badly need to rebuild our Navy to undisputed preeminence, is the need for a merchant marine. As in the 3000 Liberty and Victory ships built out of 18 shipyards in WWII. In addition to 1000 ship Navy we fielded.
Finally, if we are going to provide save passage for merchant ships, shouldn't they be flying the American flag?
Interesting question: Do you publicly and very visibly drop mines from aircraft, or do you insert them via submarine and see if they pick up on what just happened? My approach would be to lay one field by air, and lay one next to it via sub.
Air mining is fine. Maximum public effect is the object, not necessarily sinking a lot of ships. Come to think of it, a declared blockade including mines might be most effective.
I disagree. The possibility of sinking at least a few ships is absolutely required for the sake of credibility. Rather like that comment about generals and keeping the rest on their toes, or words to that effect. Lay the mines with an activation delay to become active the day after the public announcement. Consider it an intelligence test.
"This will not be easy. The Houthi are tough and stubborn. They have supplies. The goal here should be to eliminate the weapons they have, and in parallel, prevent their resupply."
Frankly, NO.
The goal here should be to destroy the Houthi, root and branch. Half measures got us into this mess.
Unless Oman is looking the other way at the border, they might as well be an island. All this stuff has to come by sea. Admiral Lockwood has the answer.
Oman is not an entity like "Jetcal" Of course their are Omanis looking the other way Probably also Emiratis, and Saudis. Almost definitely Qataris.
I do not understand how it is that after nearly 7 decades of ineptitude at such engagements Americans continue to apply assumptions based on wealthy industrial western dynamics to poor, subsistence, eastern places.
Its real simple: many of the people in the world just struggle to make it to live day to day. He who gives them the next day has their attention. He who promises them a unicorn sometime in the future might as well be from mars. In a place where a 2 dollars gets you and 80% of your neighbors by until the next day you do whatever gets you a dollar or saves you a dollar. If that's running your fishing boat across 30 miles of sea at night in a fog to meet a Persian speaking smuggler offshore to pickup a fancy looking crate you do it. If that's creating a disruption while a certain truck slips across the border you do it etc., etc., etc., ad infinitum. In short just $200000/ day $72 million per year in a place like Yemen can buy you an army and all its logistical needs.
As I've posted in the past; in Afghanistan what was just the relatively tiny percent of military logistical, construction and reconstruction funds diverted to the Taliban and their allies in a few years was enough to pay the entire Taliban force at 1 1/2 times the average annual Afghan salary for 17 years.
As I calculated in another comment its possible the Houthis can sustain their attacks on shipping with the equivalent of just 3 small boats or 3 pickup loads smuggled in per day.
You cannot go into places where people have almost nothing to lose with a strategy that depends on them being afraid of what they will lose.
Occasionally you end up with regime change. It took 3 centuries for the Romanovs to jump the shark.
1/2 a century for the 2nd Reich.
Average the 2 out and its about 1.75 centuries. Are we going to run a foreign policy on that average?
Someone has to come along with the immediate promise of something better. Autocracies and oligarchies survive not by being generally competent, but by being competent in eliminating political alternatives. Until they become so incompetent they cant even do that they rarely get replaced.
Privately I'd tell Iran that for every missile shot at international shipping, or Israel, one Iranian military facility, or political target would be destroyed. Then hit the Presidetial palace and parlament in the first strike.
The "overwhelming force" we've annouced for the Houthis should be B-52 or B1 strikes. Mine their harbors and wipe out their infrastructure.
I was looking forward to this Monday morning discussion of Yemen. Here's my question: Why is this even an issue? A half-dozen "Western Powers" have been screwing around with the Houthis for the last 1.5 years, conducting "now we'll show 'em" precision strikes with million-dollar munitions, with no appreciable deterrence.
Better figure out a way to ramp up Tomahawk production significantly, or a shortfall could become a constraint in the upcoming conflict with you-know-who.
Been talking with folks at work about this for a while. We used to board and confiscate Iranian weapons off dozens of dhows - haven't seen anything recently. Yemen is tiny and only has a few suitable ports. It should not be that hard to cut off the incoming weapons. Issue some letters of marque, station mercs on uparmored barges outside the ports and have them inspect every single inbound vessel. No impact on aid, food, etc - but starve the weapon supply. It'd be so much cheaper and more efficient than wasting our ordnance.
This sounds like the kind of low cost, high impact solution that -- cynically -- won't' be tried!
But, it should be.
USCG. Call the boardings safety checks. Back up the cutters with bigger ships with guns. Oh, wait. The Navy is too modern and sophisticated to have ships with guns. Sometimes low tech is better tech. One of the billets I had in the latter stages of my career was OinC ShipRepairDet Bahrain. Pre-Grulf War I, one of the periodic tasks we had was installing Hughes chainguns on pre-installed foundations of destroyers, for their trip thru the Bab El-Mandeb. One solution only, and may not be teh best these days.
[Funny story about that. The contractor assigned to do the installation on one ship was a one-man operation, so I went along, dressed in my very low-key uniform of the day - jeans, polo shirt, tennis shoes - and started turning wrenches. The GMC and his crew just stood around and watched until the contractor called me "Commander", at which point we had all the help we could ever want.]
USCG does have training for stuff like this, but I think this is the sort of situation that becomes cheaper and more efficient by outsourcing it professionally (like the security teams on the tankers during the somalia piracy raids) - and maybe keeping a small det there for comms/etc. (most would probably be former SOF/SEALS/etc anyways).
Also means we don't have to keep ships in the area indefinitely when we can use the mobility elsewhere.
While I generally agree with your gist, Yemen is not "tiny" its 80% the size of Afghanistan and approximately 7 times the size of South Vietnam, countries we occupied and still couldn't control.
The problem is not "their "ports". They are an insurgent group not a conventional military. They rely on a long established and resilient smuggling network to meet their needs. Most likely very little of these weapons arrives in Yemen in a single piece on anything larger than a 30 foot boat. One can go on google earth and see many places such boats just pull up on shore in Yemen. Their routes involve Oman, Somalia, Eritrea, Sudan and other countries further abroad.
The solution to this problem is interdiction on the seas and disruption of nodes outside Yemen at the granular level - the level at which Houthi and Iranian smuggling operates. Sadly our military does nothing granular, it wants to do it all in 100000 ton ship loads and that's what its suited for, worst of all the Navy. The preponderance of resources in our Navy flows uphill to the CBG fort and only then do the leftover scraps get to roll down hill to the peasants.
So we will stupidly park a CBG off one of the poorest countries on the planet for extended times and put on a demo for our adversaries to use to figure out all our weaknesses, capabilities, capacities, gaps, tolerances, behaviors etc., etc., while wasting vast amounts of munitions and stressing our forces while we drop bombs on the mushrooms as they pop up without ever starving the mycelium.
And we wonder why we keep doing the same dumb stuff and losing. When we go to war with China we'll probably be shocked at all the glitches that suddenly happen just before the shooting starts. Does anyone really think the Solong t-boned a US contracted ship by accident?
Continuing my above comment because I didn't realize Substack truncated comments without notice:
Last year the Houthis did about 100 attacks on commercial shipping. Assuming each attack averaged 5 weapons (drone, missiles) and the weapons averaged 2 tons each in total system weight per shot that's 1000 tons. 1000/365 = 2.73 tons per day. That's it, that's all the Houthis have to smuggle in per day to globally disrupt shipping. 3 little boats worth. 3 F-150 loads.
We'll know the country has learned its lessons when an ARG full of boats, helicopters smaller than an airliner, UAVs, USVs and Marines actually trained to do maritime tasks instead of Incheon 2.0 arrives in the Red Sea or better yet the Persian Gulf, until then its whack-a-shroom with a 50lb sledge hammers.
Haven't looked up the exact numbers of weapons/commercial attacks, but when they attack the current CSG (going back to IKE right after 7 Oct) - they use a LOT more weapons per attack and significantly larger ones.
Even if they used 3 times as many weapons in a year, that's still less than 10 small boat/truck loads per day along 1500 miles of coast and 1100 miles of border.
Secondly their leverage derives from them having the option to attack commercial shipping at will. The Houthi are almost certainly essentially operating as a nonprofit who's donors (including Russia) are those who want to distract the US and/or Israel. They are not pirates and thinking of them as such is a strategic error as bad as believing the Vietnamese were driven by communism more than nationalism. So long as we deploy a CSG on the mere threat of the Houthi attacking commercial shipping, the Houthi's donors are essentially puppeteering US nation policy for their gain. Its therefore the weapons fired at commercial ships that matter most strategically.
A CSG in the Red Sea is a CSG that's not ready for action against Iran or other actors. Its a CSG whos weapons load can be diminished. Its then only 1 or 2 disabled USNS ship (reference the Stena Immaculate) from degradation. Its the minimal number of weapons needed to disrupt commercial shipping that gives them the escalatory power to control US actions. The rest of the weapons just demonstrate will. Reacting this way is idiocy. The same idiocy we have engaged in since at least 2001.
Very expensive, and what do you do when someone suicide boats one of the barges?
Mine the harbors and be done with it. nothing gets in, nothing gets out.
Regarding the remarks by the UN Secretary-General: I feel bad for the innocent Yemenis, of which there are undoubtedly some, but why should the United States care more about what happens to them than their countrymen do? It was the Houthis who started this party, after all.
Further, if the UN actually wants stability and a cessation of the humanitarian crisis, then the Yemeni Civil War needs to end, part of ending said war is the defeat of the Houthi movement, and keeping the Houthis from funding themselves via extortion would go a long way towards that goal.
("But what about negotiating a settlement?" I hear a Peace Studies major plaintively cry. Well, that would be better than resolving the issue via bloodshed, but as long as the Iranians are supplying them and want to keep things going, the Houthis have no reason to negotiate unless they are decisively defeated on the battlefield.)
Recently, F-18 has not had the "usage" that F-16 had so far in these recent conflags.
US needs to wear them out like the rest of its low MC, breakable weapons.
CDR Sal, you're on a roll, keep rollin'...(-; Viewed thru the reductionist lens of "you get more of what you reward, and less of what you punish" the campaign you describe has been obvious for years. Years ago, when kidnapping and ransoming diplomats was on the rise, when Russian diplomats were kidnapped, the violent response of the Russian security services convinced the kidnappers to leave Russian diplomats alone. Took us a while (and a new administration) to learn the same lesson. The Biden administration had reasons for acting the way they did towards the Houthis as they choked off the Red Sea. The new administration does not share those reasons, hence, the enactment of the Salamander doctrine is underway. What you describe is the William Tecumseh Sherman approach to war...it's hell, understand that, embrace it, apply force to bring the message home to the government AND the populace, and you may, repeat may, shorten the violence. Stretching things out, "proportional response" only serve to keep the violence going...that is guaranteed, and the opposite of "humanitarian". Very strange that.
I listened to yesterday's episode, thanks!
Buffs & Bones.
We may an "Operation Shenandoah" where we burn everything growing in Houthi Yemen.
Nuke it and pave it over
A few asides:
"Do we have an understanding at the highest levels of government what is actually required to win against hostiles such as the Houthi?" The question should be do we understand the concept of winning.
Another point needs to be, as we badly need to rebuild our Navy to undisputed preeminence, is the need for a merchant marine. As in the 3000 Liberty and Victory ships built out of 18 shipyards in WWII. In addition to 1000 ship Navy we fielded.
Finally, if we are going to provide save passage for merchant ships, shouldn't they be flying the American flag?
Anyway, time to party like it's 1816.
Mine their ports. Get rid of Iranian ships in the area, which are almost certainly assisting in targeting US assets.
Interesting question: Do you publicly and very visibly drop mines from aircraft, or do you insert them via submarine and see if they pick up on what just happened? My approach would be to lay one field by air, and lay one next to it via sub.
Air mining is fine. Maximum public effect is the object, not necessarily sinking a lot of ships. Come to think of it, a declared blockade including mines might be most effective.
I disagree. The possibility of sinking at least a few ships is absolutely required for the sake of credibility. Rather like that comment about generals and keeping the rest on their toes, or words to that effect. Lay the mines with an activation delay to become active the day after the public announcement. Consider it an intelligence test.
Don't disagree. I did say "Declared blockade including mines".
"Is it wise to be the logistical tail for the entities attacking you?"
Hopefully someone in the Trump administration will ask and answer this question.
Shades of the Gulf of Tonkin
and the Hanoi Hilton
"This will not be easy. The Houthi are tough and stubborn. They have supplies. The goal here should be to eliminate the weapons they have, and in parallel, prevent their resupply."
Frankly, NO.
The goal here should be to destroy the Houthi, root and branch. Half measures got us into this mess.
Scuttlebutt: As is always the case with these "brush fires." If we don't put them out right away, the fire spreads.
Unless Oman is looking the other way at the border, they might as well be an island. All this stuff has to come by sea. Admiral Lockwood has the answer.
Oman is not an entity like "Jetcal" Of course their are Omanis looking the other way Probably also Emiratis, and Saudis. Almost definitely Qataris.
I do not understand how it is that after nearly 7 decades of ineptitude at such engagements Americans continue to apply assumptions based on wealthy industrial western dynamics to poor, subsistence, eastern places.
Its real simple: many of the people in the world just struggle to make it to live day to day. He who gives them the next day has their attention. He who promises them a unicorn sometime in the future might as well be from mars. In a place where a 2 dollars gets you and 80% of your neighbors by until the next day you do whatever gets you a dollar or saves you a dollar. If that's running your fishing boat across 30 miles of sea at night in a fog to meet a Persian speaking smuggler offshore to pickup a fancy looking crate you do it. If that's creating a disruption while a certain truck slips across the border you do it etc., etc., etc., ad infinitum. In short just $200000/ day $72 million per year in a place like Yemen can buy you an army and all its logistical needs.
As I've posted in the past; in Afghanistan what was just the relatively tiny percent of military logistical, construction and reconstruction funds diverted to the Taliban and their allies in a few years was enough to pay the entire Taliban force at 1 1/2 times the average annual Afghan salary for 17 years.
As I calculated in another comment its possible the Houthis can sustain their attacks on shipping with the equivalent of just 3 small boats or 3 pickup loads smuggled in per day.
You cannot go into places where people have almost nothing to lose with a strategy that depends on them being afraid of what they will lose.
1917 Russia
1918 Germany
When people don't get their daily bread, quite often you end up with regime change.
Occasionally you end up with regime change. It took 3 centuries for the Romanovs to jump the shark.
1/2 a century for the 2nd Reich.
Average the 2 out and its about 1.75 centuries. Are we going to run a foreign policy on that average?
Someone has to come along with the immediate promise of something better. Autocracies and oligarchies survive not by being generally competent, but by being competent in eliminating political alternatives. Until they become so incompetent they cant even do that they rarely get replaced.
Famine helps.
Privately I'd tell Iran that for every missile shot at international shipping, or Israel, one Iranian military facility, or political target would be destroyed. Then hit the Presidetial palace and parlament in the first strike.
The "overwhelming force" we've annouced for the Houthis should be B-52 or B1 strikes. Mine their harbors and wipe out their infrastructure.
In a free country, this would be a decision made by Congress.
I was looking forward to this Monday morning discussion of Yemen. Here's my question: Why is this even an issue? A half-dozen "Western Powers" have been screwing around with the Houthis for the last 1.5 years, conducting "now we'll show 'em" precision strikes with million-dollar munitions, with no appreciable deterrence.
Because as my dad put it: “The US never responds until we’re kicked in the balls.”
They have been popping off ordnance at USN ships since 2016.
I'd submit, follow the money. Once you understand who is paying who to do what, understanding frequently follows.
Better figure out a way to ramp up Tomahawk production significantly, or a shortfall could become a constraint in the upcoming conflict with you-know-who.
Fat Electrician has given several warnings about the folly of touching America's boats.