As further proof that the Biden administration's military methods are failing to resolve the ongoing Red Sea crisis, the Houthis targeted yet another tanker in the Gulf of Aden on Saturday with an anti-ship ballistic missile. US Central Command announced on February 25 that the missile struck the water and did not cause damage to chemical and oil products tanker the Torm Thor, flagged and owned by a US company.
On the evening of the incident, US Central Command forces also shot down two one-way unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) over the Red Sea.
Yemen's Ansar Allah movement military spokesman Yahya Saree also confirmed that several anti-ship missiles were fired at the US ship Torm Thor in the Gulf of Aden.
The incident came as the United States and its allies carried out strikes against Yemen's Houthi movement, hitting 18 military targets, the US Defense Department said on Sunday.
"Today's necessary and proportionate strikes specifically targeted 18 Houthi targets across 8 locations in Yemen associated with Houthi underground weapons storage facilities, missile storage facilities, one-way attack unmanned aerial systems, air defense systems, radars, and a helicopter," the Defense Department said in a statement. It added that the strikes were conducted by the US, the UK, Australia, Bahrain, Canada, Denmark, the Netherlands, and New Zealand in response to the "Houthis' continued attacks against commercial and naval vessels transiting the Red Sea and surrounding waterways."
However, this fresh incident appears to show how ineffective the US-led approach to resolving the situation with the Yemeni militia is. Yemen's Ansar Allah movement refuses to cower in the face of US strikes, and issued a formal notification to shipping and insurance firms of a ban on the passage of Israeli-, United States-, and United Kingdom-affiliated ships through sea routes near Yemen, a source in the movement's leadership told Sputnik.
The result is a shipping crisis that has disrupted global supply chains and driven up shipping costs. The Red Sea route typically accounts for 15 percent of total global sea trade. However, in an effort to avoid being targeted by the Houthis, traffic has been forced away from the Suez Canal, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea, and rerouted around the tip of Africa instead. Longer journeys have resulted in costlier trade between Asia and Europe, with warnings of looming inflationary impact in Europe.
Now another problem has surfaced impacting global petroleum trade - a shortage of tankers.
Commercial container vessels were the first to react to the danger of Houthi attacks and acknowledge the need to shift trade routes. However, after US and UK forces began bombing Yemen in an attempt to quell the Red Sea incidents, many global owners of oil and fuel tankers similarly opted to steer clear of the area.
With only two new supertankers expected to join the aging fleet in 2024, as per Banchero Costa shipping services data (the lowest number in close to four decades), a lack of capacity is expected to make itself acutely felt.
Only five new supertankers are set to be delivered in 2025 - a noticeable drop from the 42 ships that joined the fleet in 2022.
“The situation is tight in the tanker market, in particular for crude oil tankers,” Enrico Paglia, research manager at Banchero Costa, was cited as saying. He added that the situation was expected to grow even more challenging in the future.
However, according to recent reports, even Biden administration officials are increasingly questioning the effectiveness of their chosen approach to dealing with the Houthis, who continue their attempt to block the operations of Western commercial and navy ships in the Red Sea.