Kinzinger spells it out

 

I missed that we're no longer bombing Yemen.  Did we lose too many planes?

President Donald Trump said Tuesday that he’s ordering a halt to nearly two months of U.S. airstrikes on Yemen’s Houthis, saying the Iran-backed rebels have indicated that “they don’t want to fight anymore” and have pledged to stop attacking ships along a vital global trade route.

[...]

Trump said the Houthis had indicated to U.S. officials that “they don’t want to fight anymore. They just don’t want to fight. And we will honor that, and we will stop the bombings.”

  AP News

Oh yeah, I'm sure that's what happened. LOL.

“We’re going to stop the bombing of the Houthis, effective immediately,” Trump said at the start of his Oval Office meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.

They were kicking our butt.

That likely means an abrupt end to a campaign of airstrikes that began in March, when Trump promised to use “overwhelming lethal force” after the Houthis said they would resume attacks on Israeli vessels sailing off Yemen in response to Israel’s mounting another blockade on the Gaza Strip.

[...]

A U.S. official said the administration had not notified Israel of the agreement with the Houthis before Trump talked about it publicly.

Israel, according to this official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private diplomatic talks, was irked by the unexpected news — particularly because the Houthis have continued to launch attacks on Israel proper and other Israeli targets.

[...]

Trump was asked about the possibility that the Houthis would continue to attack Israel and responded, “I don’t know about that, frankly.”

“But I know one thing, they want nothing to do with us,” Trump said. “And they’ve let that be known through all of their surrogates and very strongly.”

[...]

In his comments during the earlier meeting with Carney, Trump said the Houthis had “capitulated but, more importantly, we will take their word that they say they will not be blowing up ships anymore. And that’s what the purpose of what we were doing.”

“I think that’s very positive,” Trump added. “They were knocking out a lot of ships.”

Their attacks caused us to lose three planes into the drink. He couldn't take the publicity.

Asked how the Houthis had communicated that they were looking to stop being targeted by U.S. bombs, Trump offered few details, saying only with a chuckle that the information came from a “very good source.”

LOLOLOLOL. Could it have been John Barron?

The costs of the U.S. munitions used against Houthi rebel targets in Yemen in daily attacks since March 15 have totaled more than $750 million, another U.S. official said. The Trump administration has dropped more than 2,000 munitions on more than 1,000 targets, according to the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to provide additional details on the strikes.

The total is only a fraction of the total costs of the operation. It doesn’t account for the costs of operating two aircraft carriers, their accompanying warships or the flight hours of the aircraft.

[...]

It also doesn’t include the Houthis destroying seven U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drones, at a cost of more than $30 million apiece, or the loss of an F/A-18 fighter jet and tug from the carrier USS Harry S. Truman when it maneuvered to avoid a Houthi missile and the jet fell off the carrier.

Or the two subsequent F/A-18s.

And, good grief, what DOES it include?

Omani Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi, confirmed that the U.S. bombing campaign was ending, posting on X that discussions involving the U.S. and Oman, as well as negotiators in Yemen, “have resulted in a ceasefire agreement between the two sides.”

“In the future, neither side will target the other, including American vessels, in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandab Strait, ensuring freedom of navigation and the smooth flow of international commercial shipping,” he wrote, calling the agreement a “welcome outcome.”

Whatever dude. Israel is still attacking them.

“As to the Houthis continuing to attack Israel - they do so at Iran’s own peril,” Republican South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said on social media.

Sit down, Lindsey. You fool.

The Houthis had been waging persistent missile and drone attacks against commercial and military ships in the region in what the group’s leadership has described as an effort to end Israel’s war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

From November 2023 until January 2025, the Houthis targeted more than 100 merchant vessels with missiles and drones, sinking two of them and killing four sailors. That has greatly reduced the flow of trade through the Red Sea corridor, which typically sees $1 trillion of goods move through it annually.

The Houthis paused attacks in a self-imposed ceasefire until the U.S. launched a broad assault against the rebels in mid-March.

Nice job, Pete.

UPDATE 05/13/2025: