Something I'm unsure about is what does and doesn't trigger wars.<p>Russian jets downed a US drone over the black sea in March 2023, I thought for sure there'd be a commensurate US military response. But there didn't appear to be one. Was it because no human was aboard the drone (so no response was justified), from fear or escalation, or something else?<p>In any case, if a large cargo ship were sunk, would the US or other nations go to war, would they retaliate with a similarly sized response, or would they do nothing (as with the Russian downing of the US drone).<p>Does anyone have some good resources on this topic? As a layperson I find military responses difficult to predict. (I'm familiar with foundational game theory, but not specific to international relations and security)
Once again we see "blowback" in action. Here's the cycle:<p>1. A major power backs a side in an internal struggle for their own end. If necessary, a conflict is manufactured by propping up rebels, a coup, etc;<p>2. The other side, which tends to be the internally popular side, resists. Because of that popular support, they can survive, thrive and grow;<p>3. Insurgencies are incredibly effective. Counter-insurgencies are incredibly difficult. The insurgents are fighting for their lives. The boots on the ground for the major power backed forces don't tend to want to be there;<p>4. Reactionary forces are seen by the besieged populace as emancipatory forces;<p>5. When the resolve of the major power breaks or there is simply a policy shift, the unpopular government crumbles and is replaced by those reactionary forces. Classic example: the fundamentalist Iranian revolution of 1979. Go and look at what Iran was like before the 1953 coup.<p>6. Those former insurgents become a regional thorn in the side for that major power for decades to come;<p>7. The major power, unwilling to commit militarily, responds with economic sanctions. This does little more than starve people and kill people due to lack of medicine. But th eregime survives. It can even be strengthened as the citizens blame the major power for their plight.<p>The Saudis committed genocide in Yemen. For years. And the world ignored it. They used US-supplied weapons to do it. At any time, the US could've ended Saudi atrocities in Yemen with a phone call.<p>And now the Houthi rebels have become battle-hardened guerillas and insurgents, capable of projecting force into the vital shipping lanes of the Red Sea. Drones have become incredibly cheap, to the point that a ragtag group will tie up a US carrier group who will try to enforce security, much like they have done with, say, Somali pirates.<p>The US carrier group may even adequately suppress the Houthis but this is attrition and Houthi investment is a drop in the ocean compared to the cost to the US.<p>The last two decades saw a massive change in drone use by the military. It was always just a matter of time before that military technology filtered down to insurgents and it's going to have a massive effect.<p>We saw this in Afghanistan in the 1970s when US-supplied Stinger missiles completely changed the battlefield as they rendered Soviet gunships ineffective at an incredibly low cost.<p>This isn't a statement supporting the Houthis (or even denoucning them). It's simply an analysis of the pattern that has played out many times, particularly since WW2.<p>This is what I mean by "blowback".
How much longer can this go on? It seems like there are so many parties whose economic interests all align that this would just be dealt with swiftly and decisively. Am I just naive? Is there no reasonably straightforward way to stop the Houthis? Wouldn't much of Europe, Saudi Arabia and others be very interested in ending this as quickly as possible?
> The US set up a multinational naval taskforce to protect the Red Sea transit route, which carries up to 12% of global trade.<p>Reminder that might is needed to create a peaceful space within which peoples can trade.
"The Singapore-flagged, Denmark-owned/operated container ship requested assistance, and the USS GRAVELY (DDG 107) and USS LABOON (DDG 58) have responded to the ship."<p>Why does a Danish owned and operated container ship fly under the Singapore flag?<p>Why did the US Navy get involved?
I'm really confused as to why no where in the article do they mention the intent of attacking the ships. As if the houthis in yemen are attacking ships because they like it or just because they "hate developed societies".<p>Their declared reason is to put pressure on Israel to allow humanitarian aid to Gaza at once. They target ships that have Israeli links or heading to Israeli ports. It can be seen as a form of treating Israel the way it's treating Gaza (as in Gaza is blockaded, so the houthis are trying to create a sea blockade from their region of control)
War is a huge escalation - usually when two countries see no other avenue than to fight it out.<p>Most wars are fought over borders. Land ownership is 0 sum game. Especially land blessed with natural resources. (Middle East is great example of oil wars)<p>In the 90s imperialism was popular - if you had the manpower and weapons, you’d take land from the weak.<p>Russia is playing land grab card against Ukraine.<p>Hamas is playing the land grab card against Israel. Although Israel being backed by US will inflict a lot more damage.<p>Africa is full of border conflicts for centuries. We don’t hear much about it since it’s a poor continent.<p>The US has the world’s largest military and a big part of what they do is to ensure their allies have their borders intact (NATO, Australia, Japan, S Korea etc).<p>So sinking some ships is likely gonna be met with some bombs on their military production facilities where missiles are made (if they figure it out).<p>For the world’s largest military, US holds much restraint not invading other countries borders, and helping democratic countries keep their borders intact.<p>If US unleashed colonialism card, we could be much larger than British empire. However the bitter lesson is that conquering is easy, maintaining power is way harder.<p>Seems China is holding restraint invading Taiwan until they see a clear win with a blitz, or another peaceful avenue.
The linchpin of this tactical situation in the Red Sea is the presence of the Iranian spy ship MV Behshad (the one that replaced the Saviz). It is giving precise targeting information of commercial ships to the Houthis to launch land-based missiles and drones. Without this ship, the Houthis would be shooting wildly into the ocean with the granularity of open-source maritime surveillance networks like marinetraffic.com.<p>Behshad's transponder's last update: <a href="https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/details/ships/shipid:657839/mmsi:422036200/imo:9167289/vessel:BEHSHAD" rel="nofollow">https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/details/ships/shipid:65...</a>
> The USS Gravely and USS Laboon responded to the incident, with the USS Gravely successfully shooting down two anti-ship ballistic missiles fired from Houthi-controlled areas in Yemen.<p>Surely this is a defensive measure against the <i>next</i> incident, rather than a response to this one?
2 hours after the missiles were fired the ship was attacked again by four small boats and attempted to board. US helicopters responding were fired upon and killed 3/4 of the boats and crews. (Reported after article written)<p>Generally, I've found @TankerTrackers on twitter is good.<p>"The ship did call on Israel's Haifa port in October and several other ports after that in Egypt, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Saudi Arabia, China, and others, based on shipping data. "
I wonder what cargo it was carrying, that got destroyed in the attack.<p>It sounds like the ship itself is still intact, which is not too surprising given how absolutely <i>huge</i> they are.
A German submarine sank the USS Reuben James in late October 1941. The US did not declare war for that incident. In fact Germany declared war on the US after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
Wow, that's a pretty awful website. You navigate to it and you get three popups. One of which is modal and blocks out the entire site. It manages to piss you off before you can even read the headline.
I’m fairly concerned this Red Sea thing can turn into what sets off inflation for real. These routes were major efficiency factors to the economy. If we lose them, there’s nothing but added cost coming for us all, and at the worst time for consumer confidence in central banks ability to manage the situation.<p>Can we just keep our shit together? It’s been a rough decade and it’s only 3 years into the 2020s…
In other news: Four (allegedly Houthi-) motor boats attacked by American helicopter; one escaped, three downed with full crew killed.<p>Consequenses for Maersk are hardly as dire as that.
This is gonna seem sort of like an off-topic comment but once we have free, unlimited, clean energy that can’t be weaponized into things like dirty bombs, a lot of these wars will simply disappear. Yes, this is a pie in the sky dream probably another 250 years away at minimum, but think about it: Don’t have carrots? Build a greenhouse and turn the lights on all day/night. Don’t have water? Condense it from the air or desalinate it.
The Bab-el-Mandeb has tons of ships in it, and as far as I know the only ones Ansar Allah have attacked are the ones who have ignored their very clear criteria.<p>It’s incredible to watch in near-real-time how hollowed out the US’s ability to project its will has become. They announced Operation Prosperity Guardian, and within days it seemed to collapse. Looks like there aren’t many folks signing up to be vassal states these days.