Yemen Taught Trump Some Lessons That He’d Do Well To Apply Towards Ukraine

Andrew Korybko
Andrew Korybko's Newsletter

The lessons from Trump’s Yemeni debacle could inform his future decisions on Ukraine.

Five New York Times (NYT) journalists collaborated to produce a detailed report earlier this week about “Why Trump Suddenly Declared Victory Over the Houthi Militia”. It’s worth reading in full if time permits, but the present piece will summarize and analyze its findings. To begin with, CENTCOM chief General Michael Kurilla proposed an eight- to -10-month campaign for degrading the Houthis’ air defenses before carrying out Israeli-like targeted assassinations, but Trump decided on 30 days instead. That’s important.

The US’ top regional military official already knew how numerous the Houthis’ air defenses were and how long it would take to seriously damage them, which shows that the Pentagon already considered Houthi-controlled North Yemen to be a regional power, while Trump wanted to avoid a protracted war. It’s little wonder then that the US failed to establish air superiority during the first month, which is why it lost several MQ-9 Reaper drones by then and exposed one of its aircraft carriers to continued threats.

The $1 billion in munitions that were expended during that period widened preexisting divisions within the administration over whether this bombing campaign was worth the mounting costs.


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