Houthis Drive for Yemen's Highlands as Trump Calls Off Strikes at the Last Minute
Houthi fighters pushed to seize the Kahboub mountains commanding the road between the Red Sea coast and Aden — while it emerged that Mr Trump prepared airstrikes on the group on Sunday after pleas from the Saudi crown prince, then called them off “even as troops were loading bombs onto aircraft”. Yemen’s president asked him directly for military help and received no pledge. The UN counts nearly 700 dead and 130,000 displaced in the flare-up; more than 3,000 have fled by boat to Djibouti, and Riyadh itself was struck at the weekend.
Bombs loaded and then unloaded is a decision as loud as any strike: Washington looked at the Houthi war, weighed its Saudi ally’s capital under fire, and chose — twice now — not to fight, a restraint explained less by doctrine than by the polling on a war already unpopular and a Muscat back-channel in which the Houthis promise to spare American ships. The highlands offensive shows what the restraint purchases: a militia consolidating from strait to mountains, converting a coastal raid into a permanent geography. For Riyadh the lesson compounds every grim week — the American guarantee is discretionary, the Chinese alternative is words, and the Mecca pact’s Pakistani muscle remains theoretical. Watch the Kahboub line and tomorrow’s Gulf-leaders meeting with Mr Trump in New York — the ask will be explicit this time.