Houthis pursue ship across the Red Sea

The Houthis in Yemen have adopted a new tactic which sees them pursuing individual ships across long stretches of the Red Sea.

An unidentified ship was attacked by the Houthis three times in the space of 12 hours today. 

The first attack happened around 115 km south of the Houthi-held port city of Hodeida, the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center said. That attack saw an explosive detonate near the ship, then a small vessel “acting suspiciously” and flashing a light near the ship came close, followed by a second blast, the UKMTO said.

The third attack happened hours later some 180 km northwest of Hodeida, with an explosion similarly sighted off the ship, the UKMTO said. The vessel and crew were reported safe.

The Houthis last week attacked a suezmax four times in the space of 24 hours. 

It is now 284 days since the Houthis first started targeting merchant shipping and the man tasked with overseeing the US Navy’s response to the attacks has conceded that military firepower alone will not halt the attacks. 

“The solution is not going to come at the end of a weapon system,” Vice Admiral George Wikoff, the commander of US Naval Forces Central Command, said last Wednesday at an event hosted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank. “It’s going to be the international community.”

“We have certainly degraded their capability. There’s no doubt about that,” Wikoff said. “However, have we stopped them? No.”

“Our mission remains to disrupt their ability and try to preserve some semblance of maritime order while we give an opportunity for policy to be developed against the Houthis,” he added.