If The Houthis Can Shut Down Naval Traffic In The Red Sea, Iran Can Close The Persian Gulf
Credit to Scott Ritter for this salient observation. We made a joint appearance on Danny Haiphong’s podcast tonight and were discussing the remarkable accomplishment of the Houthis in Yemen in shutting down commercial maritime traffic in the Red Sea. Yemen has never been known as a naval power, but it has succeeded in hurting Israel by preventing cargo container ships and oil tankers from sailing to Israel’s ports.
Although the United States has assembled a motley international armada to deal with the Yemeni threat (e.g., Canada sent three naval officers, no ship, and the Seychelles fields a small fleet of coast guard vessels that are one-fourth the size of a U.S. destroyer), there are several obstacles that will hinder the effectiveness of this hodgepodge collection of ships.
