“This campaign is about freedom of navigation and restoring deterrence. The minute the Houthis say, ‘We’ll stop shooting at your ships, we’ll stop shooting at your drones,’ this campaign will end,” Hegseth said in an interview on Fox News’s “Sunday Morning Futures,” a day after President Trump ordered the strikes.
“But until then, it will be unrelenting.”
President Trump ordered the strikes on Houthi targets on Saturday, promising to use “overwhelming lethal force” until the Iran-backed group stopped their attacks on civilian and military ships in the Red Sea, a vital maritime corridor.
Shortly after 1 p.m. Saturday, Air Force attack jets and armed drones took off from various bases in the region, along with fighter planes from the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier, to strike targets in Yemen’s capital of Sana’a, the Saada province to the north and Dhamar and Al Bayda provinces to the south.
U.S. officials said the initial wave of strikes hit more than 30 targets at multiple locations on Saturday, including terrorist training sites, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) infrastructure, weapons manufacturing capabilities and weapons storage facilities.
“It also included a number of command and control centers, including a terrorist compound where we know several senior Houthi [UAV] experts were located,” Lt. Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, joint staff director for operations, told reporters Monday.
The U.S. strikes continued on Sunday against additional headquarters locations, weapon storage facilities and what Grynkewich said were Houthi detection capabilities that have been used to threaten maritime shipping in the past.
“Today, the operation continues, and it will continue in the coming days until we achieve the president’s objectives,” he said, noting the Pentagon has assessed that the strikes have taken out “dozens” of Houthi rebels.
Trump on Monday warned Iran to stop supporting the Houthis, declaring that the country will be held directly responsible for any future attacks by the rebel group.
But the Houthis have responded that they will not be deterred by the U.S. airstrikes and vowed to retaliate for the latest U.S. attacks.
Read more in a full report at TheHill.com.
