A U.S. Navy destroyer was targeted on Wednesday (October 12) in a failed missile attack from territory in Yemen controlled by Iran-aligned Houthi rebels, the second such incident in four days, the U.S. military said.
The USS Mason fired defensive salvos in response to at least one missile which did not hit the ship or caused any damage as it operated north of the Bab al-Mandab Strait, the Pentagon said. Indications are that the second salvo brought down an incoming missile, one U.S. official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The renewed attempt to target the U.S. Navy destroyer will add pressure on the U.S. military to retaliate, a move that would represent the first direct U.S. military action against Houthis in Yemen’s conflict. The Pentagon said it would respond “at the appropriate time and in the appropriate manner.”
The United States, a longtime ally of Saudi Arabia, has provided aerial refueling of jets from a Saudi-led coalition striking Yemen and it supplies U.S. weapons sales to the kingdom.
Michael Knights, an expert on Yemen’s conflict at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said the missile attacks appeared to be the Houthis’ response to an attack last weekend, widely blamed on Saudi-led forces, on mourners gathered in Yemen’s Houthi-held capital Sanaa.
The White House says it is reviewing its support for Saudi-led forces in Yemen in the wake of Saturday’s strike, which killed at least 140 people by one count.
Knights said the targeting of U.S. warship suggested the Houthis, fighters from a Shi’ite sect that ruled a 1,000-year kingdom in northern Yemen until 1962, could be becoming more militarily aligned with groups like Lebanon’s Shi’ite militant group Hezbollah.
The USS Mason was also the target of a failed missile attack off Yemen on Sunday (October 9), and the Navy praised the resolve of sailors aboard the ship.
The missile incidents, along with an Oct. 1 strike on a vessel from the United Arab Emirates, add to questions about safety of passage for military ships around the Bab al-Mandab Strait, one of the world’s busiest shipping routes.
The Houthis, who are battling the internationally-recognized government of Yemen President Abd Rabbu Mansour al-Hadi, denied any involvement in the previous attempt to strike the USS Mason.
But U.S. officials have told Reuters there are growing indications that Houthi rebels, despite those denials, were responsible for Sunday’s incident.
(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2016
