Well, of course it is
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Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin announced Tuesday that the United States and several other nations are creating a maritime task force to protect ships transiting the Red Sea. Since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, ships allegedly owned by Israeli interests or bound for Israeli ports have come under missile and drone attacks from Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen. The Houthis have attacked at least ten commercial ships, and two ships have been hijacked, one to Yemen and one to Somalia.
The Pentagon telegraphed the announcement over the weekend: Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin Expected to Announce International Coalition to Protect Red Sea Shipping.
You can read the details at the link, but this alone should be sufficient to assess it: A collective action named ‘Operation Prosperity Guardian’.
Here are the author’s conclusions:
The most important takeaway is that this is an unnecessary coalition that reduces the ability of the US Navy to react to moves by the Houthi. By shackling the Navy to a very weak multinational coalition, layers of complexity. It could be weeks or months before a command structure is finalized and rules of engagement that have unanimous consent of the participating nations are agreed upon. This coalition's sole purpose is to make any response against the Houthi an "international" rather than an American response.
Many key participants in the anti-piracy and counter-narcotics missions and nations with a vested interest in maritime security in the Red Sea and its approaches aren't playing. Missing are Turkey, Greece, Denmark, Portugal, India and Australia. There are reports that some other nations will assist with intelligence gathering, etc., but they do not want to be publicly identified as participants. The unofficial word is that the Germans are not participating because they literally don't have ships sufficiently seaworthy for the mission.
Bahrain is the only regional country playing. This is significant because Egypt has a major role in CTF 153, and command of CTF 153 has rotated between US and Egyptian admirals. If this is a test of strength between the US and Iran (and China), the fact that Egypt and Saudi Arabia have bowed out shows which way the political winds are blowing.
The Chinese have six warships stationed in the Red Sea/Persian Gulf area of operations. They are not participating, and they are not aiding commercial traffic under attack. Draw your own conclusions.
… In my view, this is just another case of the Biden national security apparatus trying to give the impression of doing something while doing nothing. The obvious reason they are doing nothing is that Biden, Sullivan, etc., don't want to offend Iran. Instead of looking after our national interests (safe and rapid transit of sea lanes) and showing confidence and leadership, the Biden White House has elected to show weakness and uncertainty. Nothing good will come from this.
