President Joe Biden is once again failing on the world stage to protect American interests and to deter aggression from America’s enemies as the Iranian-backed Houthi terrorist organization seriously damaged a cargo ship near the Arabian Peninsula over the weekend and appeared to shoot down a U.S. drone.
British maritime authorities said that the attack on the Belize-flagged commercial shipping vessel M/V Rubymar happened 35 nautical miles south of Al Mukha, Yemen, in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait connecting the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.
The front of the vessel and its engine room were hit by anti-ship ballistic missiles, an official at the ship’s company told Bloomberg. The crew was forced to abandon the ship due to the damage.
The Houthis claimed in a statement that the ship had “suffered catastrophic damage” and that it was “now at risk of potential[ly] sinking.”
The ship’s security firm, LSS-SAPU, told the BBC: “We know she was taking in water. There is nobody on board now. The owners and managers are considering options for towage.”
The successful missile strikes represent a new escalation in the region by the Houthis, as this marks the first time that a crew has been forced to abandon ship because of the level of damage sustained from one of the group’s terrorist attacks.
“Between 9:30 and 10:45 p.m., Feb. 18, two anti-ship ballistic missiles were launched from Iranian-backed Houthi terrorist-controlled areas of Yemen toward MV Rubymar, a Belize-flagged, UK-owned bulk carrier,” U.S. Central Command said in a statement. “One of the missiles struck the vessel, causing damage. The ship issued a distress call, and a coalition warship, along with another merchant vessel, responded to the call to assist the crew of the MV Rubymar. The crew was transported to a nearby port by the merchant vessel.”
The Financial Times reported that two additional cargo ships were also attacked, including the U.S.-owned M/V Sea Champion and the Denmark-owned M/V Navis Fortuna.
The Houthis also claimed that they shot down a U.S. MQ-9 Reaper, an unarmed drone used for surveillance and intelligence gathering, over Yemen early on Monday morning.
“Yemeni air defenses were able to shoot down an American plane (MQ-9) with a suitable missile while it was carrying out hostile missions against our country on behalf of the Zionist entity,” a spokesperson for the terrorist group said. “Yemeni armed forces will not hesitate to take more military measures and carry out more qualitative operations against all hostile targets in defense of beloved Yemen.”
The U.S. confirmed that a drone crashed near Hodeidah, Yemen, early on Monday but declined to say whether it was shot down or if some other incident led to it crashing. The Houthis shot down a U.S. drone in November.
The latest attacks from the Houthis come as Biden has repeatedly refused to use the force necessary to prevent and deter future acts of aggression because he fears confrontation with Iran despite the U.S. military being by far the most powerful military in the world. Biden recently admitted that his strategy against the Houthis was not working.
The attacks are being assisted by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization, which is providing the Houthis with intelligence and targeting information for its attacks.
The U.S. conducted a strike against the M/V Behshad, an Iranian military vessel that looks like a cargo ship that the IRGC uses to “provide targeting information to the Houthis so their attacks on the ships can be more effective.”
The cyberattack was carried out with the goal of inhibiting the ship’s ability to share intelligence with the Houthis, NBC News reported last week, adding that the U.S. rarely ever discusses covert missions with the media, including cyberattacks.
The ship is registered as a commercial cargo ship with an Iranian company sanctioned by the U.S. for being a front for the country’s Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines (IRISL).
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) uses the ship as a front base in the region to collect and share intelligence with terrorists, according to CNN, which added that the ship was sanctioned under former President Donald Trump.
Vice Admiral Brad Cooper, the U.S. military’s deputy commander in the Middle East, told CBS News’s “60 Minutes” in an interview that aired on Sunday that the Houthis could not conduct these attacks without Iran’s direct assistance.
“For a decade, the Iranians have been supplying the Houthis,” he added. “They’ve been resupplying them. They’re resupplying them as we sit here right now, at sea. We know this is happening. They’re advising them, and they’re providing targeting information. This is crystal clear.”
When asked if the IRGC was on the ground in Yemen providing direct support to the Houthis for their attacks, Cooper answered: “The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps is inside Yemen, and they are serving side by side — with the Houthis, advising them and providing targeting information.”
Biden’s inability or unwillingness to protect and deter attacks against U.S. interests comes as he faces low polling numbers headed into the 2024 presidential election in a likely rematch against Trump.
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Biden has repeatedly demonstrated weakness on the world stage, including with his disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, where Al-Qaeda is now rapidly regrowing; his weakness in deterring Russia from invading Ukraine, leading to an expensive war that the U.S. is having to help fund; getting pushed around by communist China during official meetings on U.S. soil; failing to respond forcefully to more than 170 attacks on U.S. forces in the Middle East by Iranian-backed Islamic terrorist groups; to pushing U.S. partners like Saudi Arabia and India closer to Russia and China.
Related: Houthi Terrorist Missile Came Within Few Seconds Of Hitting U.S. Warship