Houthi’s Iranian missiles aimed for US ship, not Israel

It is unlikely that the launch of three cruise missiles and eight drones by the Houthis in Yemen was aimed at Israel. Rather, the attack was aimed at the US destroyer, USS Carney.

Unless new, much longer-range cruise missiles have arrived in Yemen, the cruise missiles fired at the USS Carney, an Admiral Burke-class destroyer, probably lacked the range to hit Israel. So far, the US Navy has not clarified whether the missiles were aimed at the Carney or Israel, saying it is looking into the matter.

Three cruise missiles and eight Kamikaze drones were taken out by the Carney. The cruise missiles were intercepted by SM-2 missiles launched by the AEGIS air defense system. The Navy has not told us what weapons were used to go after the drones.

The US has not responded to the cruise missile and drone attacks, has launched no punitive attacks on Yemen, or done anything to sanction the real source, Iran.

The use of drones and cruise missiles is a tactic employed by the Houthis in the past to go after the Patriot Air Defense System. Saudi Arabia has the Patriot system and the US has deployed Patriots there too.

The idea behind it is to use the drones to smash into the radars of the Patriot, disabling the system. After the radars are killed, the cruise missiles can either be used to hit the Patriot command centers or launchers, or it can go after other important targets since the Patriot would not be available to defeat the cruise missiles.

Iran used cruise missiles along with drones in the 2019 attack on the Khurais and Abqaiq oil installations in Saudi Arabia. These were either launched from Iranian territory or northern Iraq.

The cruise missile used by the Iranians was the model Iran prepared for the Houthis and not the cruise missiles in Iran’s own arsenal such as the Soumar, which is based on the Russian KH-55 “Kent” (the NATO name). The Soumar has a range of 3,000 kilometers (1,864 miles) and, if launched from Yemen, could hit targets in Israel.

There is no information that Soumar-type cruise missiles are in Yemen. The cruise missiles known to be in Yemen are the Quds-1, Quds-2 and Quds-3. The range of the Quds-2 is 1,350 kilometers (840 miles) and Quds-3 perhaps 2,000 kilometers (1,243 miles).

The Quds is somewhat smaller than the Soumar or Kent and it uses a less capable turbofan engine. The Saudis recovered most of a Quds-2 cruise missile that crashed in the desert. Of these, only the Quds-3 can potentially hit Israeli targets thanks to its larger fuel tank.