The U.S. Is Choosing Escalation and a Wider War

There is always a choice when it comes to using force.

Spencer Ackerman is not impressed by defenses of the U.S./U.K. strikes in Yemen:

The respectable set says that once the Houthis started attacking Red Sea shipping, a U.S. reprisal was inevitable. There's a lazy-person's truth here, for sure. Like the Royal Navy before it, the U.S. Navy sails under the banner of free trade. Any form of trade requires safe shipping lanes. Suez Canal traffic is down by something like 25 percent. Something like 10-12 percent of global commerce traverses the Red Sea. 

The problem with this sort of thinking is that it confuses a justification for a military action with a strategy that produces a desired result. It treats a choice as an inevitability, and then, when convinced there is no alternative, intensifies a losing course of action when the choice doesn't produce the desired result and instead makes everything worse.

There is always a choice when it comes to using force. Even when another party has taken the first shot, there is nothing inevitable about military action. As many people have reminded us since October 7, the Indian government chose restraint in response to the 2008 Mumbai attacks rather than lashing out with military reprisals, and that was clearly the wiser course of action. The Houthi attacks on commercial shipping are comparatively minor and trivial by comparison, but the U.S. and its allies chose to use force rather than explore other possible alternatives.

Escalating the situation is an overreaction given the limited costs incurred from Houthi attacks thus far. As Ben Friedman of Defense Priorities pointed out in a statement yesterday, the U.S. and its allies have exaggerated the problem caused by Houthi attacks:

The fact is that the Houthi attacks on shipping have not been particularly effective, nor are they a major economic issue.

While the original attacks have not done much damage, the reprisals to come could do significantly more harm. Everyone, including U.S. officials, acknowledges that the U.S./U.K. strikes will not stop future Houthi attacks, and most people expect that the Houthis will intensify and broaden their attacks. Indeed, they have declared that all American and British interests are now “legitimate targets” following last night’s strikes. The strikes have not only put U.S. sailors and ships in the vicinity at risk, but they have potentially put all U.S. personnel throughout the region in greater danger.

The Biden administration does not appear to have thought through what comes next when the Houthis are not deterred and instead expand their attacks. The president left the door open to further strikes in Yemen in his statement last night, and presumably he will be under pressure to make good on the threat of ordering more attacks. The president has foolishly put himself and the U.S. in a bad position where he will feel compelled to escalate further to back up threats that he should never have made for fear of looking “weak.” Of course, there is nothing weaker than resorting to force when you don’t have to do it.

The U.S. has also failed to consider the political consequences of using force in the name of safeguarding commerce while the war in Gaza grinds on with its unconditional support. The U.S. is fueling an atrocious war and backing a policy of collective punishment against two million people, but the slightest interruption of the “free flow of commerce” is so intolerable to Washington that it is cause for using force. War crimes, over 16,000 civilian casualties, and the use of starvation as a weapon are not enough to make the Biden administration stop the flow of weapons to one of its clients, but forcing commercial ships to reroute is beyond the pale and merits punishment. How does the Biden administration think that looks to the rest of the world? How does it advance and secure U.S. interests to make our country into an accomplice to mass killing, forced displacement, and man-made famine while our leaders preen about the importance of open shipping lanes?

Perhaps the most absurd thing about the strikes in Yemen is that the U.S. and Britain are giving the Houthis exactly the confrontation they desire. They have thrived on conflict, and each new round of conflict has left them in a relatively stronger position than they were in before. Their attacks on commercial ships in response to the war in Gaza had already given them a boost at home because their actions have been very popular, and now U.S. and U.K. strikes are likely going to give them another boost. Far from deterring them from launching more attacks, the U.S. and British strikes have played into their hands. What is most frustrating about this is that it was all perfectly obvious to the people that know even a little about Yemen, but the administration is evidently paying no attention to any of those people.

The Biden administration keeps claiming that it wants to prevent a wider war, but through its actions it is choosing escalation and a wider war.