I mean, yeah, but that’s just because most countries don’t invest heavily into anti-ship missiles. That’s more of a superpower thing usually–they’re hella expensive, and you’re generally only using them if you’re at war with a naval power of some sort. Then, when you want to actually sink a (non-Russian) combat ship with them, you need to fire a shitload to oversaturate the missile defense and get a good chance of a hit.
So, you want a lot of them too.
Expensive, need a lot of them, and having limited utility? Yes, a very niche capability. Especially when submarines also exist, are also good at sinking ships, and are re-useable.
What is the Houthi strategy here? Shooting at commercial shipping, which is the lifeblood of international trade, seems like a good way to bring on an international ass-kicking. I’m reminded of that time the Russians decided they didn’t like Somali pirates.
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What do the Houthis think they’re going to gain from disrupting international trade? I mean, what is the end goal that they think can happen other than being bombed back?
Continued money and arms from Iran for being a distraction.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
On Sunday, the U.S. said there had been “four attacks against three separate commercial vessels operating in international waters in the southern Red Sea,” launched from Houthi-controlled territory in Yemen.
Several drones were shot down by the U.S. warship, the USS Carney, as a series of missiles were fired from Houthi territory and damaged two of the cargo vessels, the U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said in a statement.
The Houthi rebels’ “anti-ship missile arsenal is not only comparable but superior to probably most state actors,” according to Fabian Hinz, a research fellow specializing in Middle East defense and military analysis at the International Institute for Strategic Studies think tank.
“Such capabilities are highly unusual for an insurgency,” said Sidharth Kaushal, a research fellow at the U.K.'s Royal United Services Institute think tank.
Two of the cargo ships struck by Houthi missiles in the Red Sea on Sunday, the Unity Explorer and the Number 9, reported damage, CENTCOM said.
The USS Carney arrived in the region days after the Hamas attacks in the latter strike group “in order to deter any actor seeking to escalate the situation or widen this war,” CENTCOM said at the time.
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