This is John Batchel, a conversation with colleague Edmund Fitton Brown on the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies about the Houthis of Yemen.

And does air power intimidate or corral or defeat the Houthis?

It would appear not. However, Edmund adds an important detail about the Houthis and the threat of American Air Power in future.

More of this tonight.

Here's Edmund.

So let me answer that in two parts, Bill, because I think it's important to mention the Houthi context as well, since you do.

You're right that the Houthis were not defeated,

but they certainly didn't win. They took a lot of hits, and they were desperate for the end of the fight with the United States, the seven-week war from March through May last year. And the reason they were

desperate was that it was also paralyzing their ability to prosecute the civil war in Yemen. It's one of the

least understood parts of this U.S. Houthi war in 2025, is that whilst the U.S. was flying its missions in Yemen,

the Houthis who were planning to try to take the city of Marib in central Yemen

and were building their forces and engineering works to do that, they had to disperse the entire

siege because they knew that any massing of forces would be shredded from the sky by the US.

And so this is quite an important point because if we're thinking about what may eventually

happen in Yemen, any future round of hostilities with the Houthis, the US should take some comfort from the fact that its presence is a real problem for the Houthis because it stops them from their ability to take over more of Yemen from the internationally recognized government.