Trump's sights set on Iran after US airstrikes decimate more than 30 Houthi targets

U.S. airstrikes over the weekend took out Houthi drone, missile and air defense systems, but it remains to be seen whether they struck a lethal blow at their main target: the Iranian regime’s resolve. 

Joint Staff Director for Operations Lt. Gen. Alexus Grynkewich told reporters "dozens of military casualties" had so far been counted, and that he had seen "no credible indications of any civilian casualties." 

He added that an initial wave of strikes "hit over 30 targets at multiple locations, degrading a variety of Houthi capabilities." 

"These included terrorist training sites, unmanned aerial vehicle infrastructure, weapons manufacturing capabilities, and weapons storage facilities." 

US MILITARY SHOOTS DOWN HOUTHI DRONES AS TRUMP'S STRIKES AGAINST TERRORIST GROUP CONTINUE

Yemen's Houthi rebels claimed 53 people had been killed, including five children. Attacks began Saturday and continued into Monday. 

Pentagon chief spokesperson Sean Parnell said the message in the strikes was, "If you shoot at American troops there will be consequences." 

At the same time, he emphasized, "this is also not an endless offensive. This is not about regime change in the Middle East, this is about putting American interests first."

But President Donald Trump had been clear that while the Houthis were the target of the attacks, Iran would be held responsible for any retaliation. 

"Any further attack or retaliation by the ‘Houthis’ will be met with great force, and there is no guarantee that that force will stop there. Iran has played ‘the innocent victim’ of rogue terrorists from which they’ve lost control, but they haven’t lost control," he wrote on Truth Social. 

"They’re dictating every move, giving them the weapons, supplying them with money and highly sophisticated Military equipment, and even, so-called, ‘Intelligence.’ Every shot fired by the Houthis will be looked upon, from this point forward, as being a shot fired from the weapons and leadership of IRAN, and IRAN will be held responsible, and suffer the consequences, and those consequences will be dire!"

IRANIAN GENERAL RESPONDS TO TRUMP THREATS AGAINST HOUTHI REBELS

The Houthis announced last week they would ramp up attacks on the Red Sea once more, claiming they were doing so to pressure Israel to allow humanitarian aid to flow back into Gaza. 

The group had halted strikes in January when the Gaza ceasefire was first announced. 

Trump last week tried the diplomatic route with Iran, writing a letter to its supreme leader asking for engagement in nuclear talks. But Iran, enraged by Trump’s stated intentions to return to a "maximum pressure" sanctions campaign, said it would not engage with the U.S.

Trump has said its strikes will continue "with overwhelming lethal force" until the Houthis are eliminated as a threat. 

But what elimination would look like – especially if the Houthi attacks persisted – was vague. 

US NAVY SHIPS REPEL ATTACK FROM HOUTHIS IN GULF OF ADEN

Parnell refused to say whether U.S. troops could be deployed to Yemen. "It's very difficult, if not impossible, for us to talk about force, posture from this podium," he said. "It's very important to keep the enemy guessing."

Zineb Riboua, research fellow and program manager of the Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East, explained that the U.S. strikes aimed to destroy missile and launch sites used to target Red Sea shipping and disrupt supply chains that feed Iranian weaponry to the Houthis.

"However, the effectiveness of these operations depends on two key factors: Did they cripple Houthi capabilities? The group has proven resilient, especially if Iran continues to funnel weapons and intelligence support," Riboua said. 

The Houthis responded with unsuccessful strikes on the aircraft carrier USS Harry S Truman.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio claimed Sunday that over the past 18 months, Houthi fighters had attacked the U.S. Navy "directly" 174 times and had targeted commercial shipping 145 times using "guided precision anti-ship weaponry."

The Houthis in recent years have attacked unarmed Western ships carrying goods through the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden – and the U.S. military has responded with strikes that were seemingly limited in scope, not a full-scale declaration of war.

The attacks have led to perilous waters along a trade route that typically sees some $1 trillion in goods pass through it, as well as shipments of aid to war-torn Sudan and the Yemeni people.  

"We are already on day 3 of the military campaign and it has been unrelenting. This is much different than the smaller and more limited strikes during the Biden administration," said Hudson fellow Rebeccah Heinrichs.

"The days of pinprick responses where we allow that to occur is over. That's, I think, a pretty clear statement from the administration as a whole as well," State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce told reporters Monday of the renewed offensive. 

Iran sought to distance itself from its proxy forces. Pamilitary Revolutionary Guard Gen. Hossein Salami said Iran "plays no role in setting the national or operational policies" of the groups it allies itself with. 

But some restraint-minded voices don’t believe the U.S. should be spending its resources to fight the Houthis, who haven't publicly attacked maritime positions since November. 

"The people affected, I think, are more European and Chinese than American," said Ben Friedman, policy director at Defense Priorities. "So it’s not clear to me why the U.S. should be doing this. If the Europeans want to deal with it, fine, but I don’t think everything needs to be our responsibility, especially when they’re not doing much damage [to us]."

"He’s doing what should have been done under the Biden administration," said Gene Moran, former Navy captain and former advisor to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs. But at the same time, "We shouldn’t be fooled into thinking we can knock down an ideology with kinetic weapons. We’ve made that mistake time over time, something needs to be done with Iran. 

"Trump has proven with his relationship with Russia, he can flip the table over a weekend, change the whole conversation. So I would think that Trump would do something very decisive with Iran. He may find he doesn’t have to do that with kinetic power." 

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Iran’s uranium enrichment has breached 60%, dangerously close to the 90% enrichment needed to make a bomb. 

Tehran still denies it is pursuing a nuclear weapon, but experts have said there is no civilian use for 60% enriched uranium.