American Magazine: What will Trump do to prevent Iranian arms supplies to the Houthis in Yemen?

The American National Review magazine said, "The next President, Donald Trump, must make clear that if our country is exposed to weapons from Iran, the United States will strike hard - and directly - against Iran."

The magazine published a report prepared by Elliott Abrams - a senior fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and head of the Vandenberg Alliance - and translated by "Yemeni Youth Net", in which he pointed out that for years, Houthi terrorists in Yemen have been attacking US Navy ships while the United States plays the role of defense.

In July, the commander of U.S. Central Command, Gen. Erik Kurilla, warned of the risks to our ships and sailors. The Wall Street Journal reported: “In a recent confidential letter to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, the top U.S. commander in the Middle East noted that military operations in the region have “failed” to deter Houthi attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and that a broader approach is needed…”

And last month, in December 2024, U.S. Central Command reported more attacks: The Houthis fired at least eight one-way unmanned aerial systems, five anti-ship ballistic missiles and three anti-ship cruise missiles at the U.S. warships Spruance ( DDG-111 ) and Stock Dale ( DDG-106 ).

This is the second time the two independently deployed destroyers have come under Houthi fire. The Houthis also attacked the destroyers, as well as the USS Indianapolis ( LCS-17 ), in late September.

Corella's message comes after hundreds of "Houthi attacks" — except that these were in fact Iranian attacks on the US Navy, using Iranian missiles fired by their Houthi proxies.

As the Defense Intelligence Agency ( DIA ) reported in February 2024, analysis confirms that Houthi forces have used Iranian-made missiles and drones against military and civilian targets across the region.

Since 2014, the Quds Force of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has provided the Houthis with a growing arsenal of advanced weapons and training. Iranian assistance has enabled the Houthis to wage a campaign of missile and drone attacks against commercial shipping in the Red Sea since November 2023.

The US Defense Intelligence Agency report, entitled “Iran Enables Houthis to Carry Out Attacks Across the Middle East,” stated the following:

Since at least 2015, Iran has provided the Houthis with a diverse arsenal of short- and medium-range ballistic and cruise missiles, including anti-ship variants, enabling the Houthis to launch attacks against targets on land and at sea. Iranian ballistic and cruise missiles allow the Houthis to attack targets in a variety of directions.

The real question here is why General Kurilla’s letter did not lead to more action against the source of the Houthi weapons, Iran. Kurilla told the Senate Armed Services Committee in March that there was no way to reduce the Houthi arsenal if Iran could simply rebuild it:

We also want to degrade the Houthis’ offensive capability, their anti-ship ballistic missiles, their anti-ship missiles, and many other systems that they use, which are provided by Iran. But degrading that capability means nothing if Iran is able to resupply them. So we are working to deny Iran the ability to resupply them, and that’s where we need a more comprehensive international and governmental approach to be able to prevent Iran from resupplying the Houthis.

The Biden administration has stepped up its attacks on the Houthis in recent weeks, but has done nothing to punish their suppliers. As of January 20, that is the question facing President Trump. What will be done to prevent Iran from resupplying the Houthis? Will Houthi attacks on U.S. Navy ships carrying Iranian-supplied weapons be allowed to continue?

President Trump faced a similar problem in September 2020 after Iranian proxies ramped up attacks on U.S. forces in western Iraq and Syria over the summer. Americans were injured but not killed.

The Trump administration then advised Iran, through multiple channels, that if an Iranian proxy group killed an American in one of these attacks, the U.S. response would be directed against Iran directly—not just the proxy. Iran itself would pay the price.

Following this warning, such attacks dropped by about 90 percent in the last quarter of 2020. During the Biden administration, they rose again: for example, in one year between October 2023 and November 2024, there were 125 attacks in Syria and 79 in Iraq. On January 28, 2024, three Americans were killed in a drone attack on a US position across the Syrian border in Jordan.

The right path for the new Trump administration is not to surrender to Iranian and Houthi attacks by withdrawing our forces from Iraq and Syria, nor to withdraw the US Navy from international waters in the Middle East – the Red Sea and the Bab el-Mandeb.

Rather, it boils down to a repetition of Trump’s 2020 approach: making it clear to Iran that if an American is killed or wounded, or a U.S. Navy ship is hit, by an Iranian-supplied Houthi weapon, the United States will respond directly against Iran.

As General Kurilla said, we must seek to prevent the supply of such weapons, but that is not enough; and such an effort will not be 100 percent effective. The better way forward is to deter Iran from supplying weapons to the Houthis by making Iran pay for any damage that occurs.

Let’s stop playing Tehran’s game of letting Iran hide behind its proxies. President Trump must make clear that if Iranian-supplied weapons hit us, the United States will strike hard—and directly—against Iran.