CNN
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In the month since the US launched a major military campaign targeting the Houthi rebel group in Yemen, the militants have successfully shot down at least seven multi-million-dollar American drones, hindering the US’ ability to move into “phase two” of the operation, multiple US officials familiar with the matter told CNN.
The US was hoping to achieve air superiority over Yemen within 30 days, officials said and degrade Houthi air defense systems enough to begin a new phase focusing on ramping up intelligence, reconnaissance and surveillance of senior Houthi leaders in order to target and kill them, the officials said.
But the platforms best suited to conduct that persistent effort, the MQ9 Reaper drones, keep getting shot down, the officials explained. In fact, the Houthis are only getting better at targeting them, the officials said. The US does not have boots on the ground in Yemen, so it relies on overhead surveillance — much of it from the MQ9s—to conduct battlefield damage assessments and track terrorists.
CNN reported earlier this month that the US had killed several Houthi officials considered to be mid-level, akin to “middle management,” rather than senior political leadership.
The officials said the US had hit over 700 targets and launched more than 300 airstrikes since the campaign began on March 15. The strikes have forced the Houthis to stay underground more and left them in a “confused and disarrayed state,” the officials noted.
But the consistent loss of the drones has made it more difficult for the US to determine precisely how much the US has degraded the Houthis’ weapons stockpiles.
Over the last six weeks, the Houthis have launched 77 one-way attack drones, 30 cruise missiles, 24 medium-range ballistic missiles, and 23 surface-to-air missiles either at US forces, into the Red Sea, or at Israel, two of the officials said.
The intelligence community has also assessed in recent days that over nearly six weeks of US bombing, the Houthis’ ability and intent to keep lobbing missiles at US and commercial vessels in the Red Sea and at Israel is little changed, as is their command-and-control structure, according to two other people familiar with the intelligence. These assessments were largely based on signals intelligence, one of the people said.
Asked for comment about the downed drones and whether it has negatively impacted the operation, a defense official told CNN in a statement that “we are aware of the Houthi reports these MQ-9s have been shot down. While hostile fire is likely a probable cause, the circumstances of each incident are still under investigation. A variety of factors, including an increase in operational tempo, can increase risk. The U.S. will take every measure possible to protect our troops, equipment, and interests in the region.”
Dave Eastburn, a spokesman for US Central Command, told CNN details about the US’ operation were limited because of operational security. He said, however, that the strikes “have destroyed multiple command-and-control facilities, air defense systems, advanced weapons manufacturing facilities, advanced weapons storage locations, and killed hundreds of Houthi fighters and numerous Houthi leaders.”
“Credible open sources report over 650 Houthi casualties to date,” Eastburn said. “Additionally, Houthi ballistic missile launches have dropped by 87% while attacks from their one-way drones have decreased by 65% since the beginning of these operations.”
The administration is vowing to continue with the campaign until the Houthis can no longer attack Red Sea shipping. In a letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson last month, President Donald Trump said the operations would continue “until the Houthi threat to United States forces and navigational rights and freedoms in the Red Sea and adjacent waters has abated.”
But the Houthis have long proven to be extremely resilient, burying their equipment deep underground and continuing to receive supplies from Iran. They withstood a yearslong campaign by Saudi Arabia to eliminate them, and the Biden administration attacked them for over a year with limited impact.
Despite internal assessments raising questions about the efficacy of the campaign, the Trump administration has repeatedly claimed that it has been wildly successful so far. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called it “devastatingly effective” in March. Trump posted on X in March that the Houthis “have been decimated” and their capabilities “are rapidly being destroyed.”
While Eastburn provided additional data on Thursday regarding the impact of US strikes, US Central Command has been largely silent about the impact, however, even as it routinely shares photos and videos on its X account of missiles firing off of warships or US aircraft preparing to launch off aircraft carriers in the Red Sea. The Pentagon has also not addressed claims by the Houthis that the airstrikes have killed dozens of civilians.
In a rare update, CENTCOM said last week that it had destroyed a port in Yemen that the Houthis were using to import oil and fuel their attacks. But the impact of that on the Houthis’ operations similarly remains unclear.
One of the US officials who spoke to CNN left the door open for a continuous campaign in support of US partners in the Gulf region against the Houthis, similar to how the US operates in Africa.
The costs of the campaign, meanwhile, are only rising. The operation cost the US nearly $1 billion in just the first three weeks, and the US has continued striking Houthi targets daily for over a month.
The large-scale operation has also rattled some officials at US Indo-Pacific Command, who CNN has reported had complained in recent weeks about the large number of long-range weapons being expended by CENTCOM that would be critical in the event of a war with China.
“We have to maintain a high state of indications and warning so we can get those forces back if there is a crisis with greater exigence than there is one in the CENTCOM (area of responsibility),” US Indo-Pacific Command Commander Adm. Sam Paparo told the Senate Armed Services Committee earlier this month, after an entire Patriot air defense battalion was moved from the Pacific to US Central Command.
“And I owe the secretary and the president constant vigilance on this,” he added, “and a constant awareness of that force’s ability – which is assigned to INDOPACOM, the Carl Vinson Strike Group and a Patriot battalion – if need be that they return to the INDOPACOM theater for a higher priority threat.”
