Mawadda Iskandar / The Cradle
In a major recalibration of its year-long Red Sea military campaign, the US has agreed to a ceasefire with Yemen’s Ansarallah-aligned armed forces, brokered by Oman. After months of escalating attacks under the guise of “protecting international shipping,” Washington now finds itself calling time on a conflict it launched – but failed to control.
While Yemen’s leaders stress that operations in support of Gaza will persist, the US pivot signals more than de-escalation: It is a tacit admission that its campaign has collapsed under pressure, unable to achieve even its most basic strategic goals.
With over a thousand airstrikes launched since March 2024, Washington’s failure to contain the Yemeni threat in the Red Sea, Bab al-Mandab Strait, and the Gulf of Aden stands as a stark indictment of its military planning. The war devolved into a costly, high-stakes exercise in attrition – one Yemen emerged from stronger, not weaker.
A flawed campaign from the start
From its inception, the US-led campaign ‘Prosperity Guardian’ lacked clarity. The mission to “protect shipping lanes” quickly became an open-ended confrontation with no political roadmap. American officials misread both the battlefield and Yemen’s resilience.
Despite the might of its airpower, Washington failed to dent Sanaa’s capacity or will to fight. Instead, the bombardment accelerated Yemen’s military innovation, forcing Washington into a deterrence game it could not win. Yemen’s unconventional warfare style, grounded in its topography and culture, posed immense challenges. Leaders operated from mountainous terrain fortified by tunnel systems, well beyond the reach of satellite surveillance.
The US had little intelligence penetration into Yemen’s military hierarchy and no functioning target bank. Sanaa’s leadership, experienced from years of prior war against the Saudi and UAE-led coalition and its proxies, held the advantage.
Speaking to The Cradle, Colonel Rashad al-Wutayri lists five key reasons for the campaign’s failure. First, Yemen’s use of low-cost, high-impact weapons – ballistic missiles and drones – pierced even US carrier strike groups.
Second, the campaign failed to protect Israeli or allied shipping. Third, Ansarallah exposed Israeli-American spy networks and clung to its demands: Namely, an end to the war on Gaza. Fourth, apart from Bahrain, Washington’s Arab allies declined to join the US-led coalition. Fifth, the financial cost spiraled, with the US spending millions on interceptors to counter drones built for mere thousands….
https://scheerpost.com/2025/05/09/us-ceasefire-in-yemen-retreat-masquerading-as-restraint
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