Why bombing alone has failed against the Houthis and what it would take to defeat the

The Houthis pose a serious threat and a military problem that is far harder to solve than much of the Israeli and international media coverage might suggest. In 2024 and 2025, the United States tried three times, unsuccessfully, to suppress the group through air campaigns. After the third effort, the massive March-April 2025 bombing campaign known as Operation Rough Rider, Washington concluded that it could not defeat the fanatical Shiite Islamist rebels from the air alone. President Donald Trump therefore declared victory, said the Houthis had promised him they would stop attacking American ships and withdrew US forces from the arena, even though the campaign had not significantly degraded their ability to block the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, strike Saudi and Emirati oil infrastructure with missiles and drones, or launch ballistic missiles nearly 2,000 kilometers toward Israel. The IDF, meaning the Israeli Air Force primarily, achieved somewhat more.