The 2026Iran conflicthas generated considerable speculation about American overreach and strategic strain. However, the behavior of the actors best positioned to exploit U.S. military engagement, includingIran’s proxiesin the Middle East, the Houthis, Hezbollah, and Hamas, aswell as Chinain the Indo-Pacific and Russia in Europe, suggests the opposite.
Rather than taking advantage of a supposed vacuum created by the shift in U.S. military attention, America’s adversaries have largely acted with caution and restraint. Their behavior suggests that they recognize the United States remains the premier military power on earth. They also appear to understand that the U.S. is capable of conducting operations in one theater without forfeiting its ability to respond decisively in another.
Beginning in November 2023, during the Biden administration, the Iran-backed Houthi militia launched a sustained campaign of drone and missile strikes against commercial shipping in the Red Sea. The economic damage was severe. The Defense Intelligence Agency reported that the attacks impacted at least 65 countries and forced at least 29 major energy and shipping companies to alter their routes, with alternate shipping routes around Africa adding around 11,000 nautical miles and increasing fuel costs by approximately $1 million per voyage.
The DIA put the decline in container shipping through the Red Sea atapproximately 90 percentbetween December 2023 and February 2024. The International Transport Forum estimated the total additional cost to global trade at $15 to $20 billion annually for the duration of the disruption. The Russell Group estimated$1 trillionin goods disrupted from October 2023 to May 2024.
The Biden administration’s response,Operation Prosperity Guardianlaunched in December 2023, became the most sustained combat experience for the U.S. Navy since World War II. Despite the Navy neutralizing 380 Houthi-launched projectiles through January 2025, the shipping lanes did not recover. Iran, as the Houthis’ primary benefactor, supplied the group with weapons transfers, training, and intelligence support, with theCongressional Research Servicedocumenting Iranian provision of ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, drones, and IRGC advisory personnel that sustained the campaign.
Trump escalated.Operation Rough Riderlaunched March 15, 2025, with the stated goal of restoring freedom of navigation in the Red Sea. By April 28, U.S. Central Command reported over 800 targets struck, with a 69 percent reduction in Houthi ballistic missile launches and a 55 percent decrease in one-way drone attacks. On May 6, Oman brokered a ceasefire under which neither side would target the other in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandab Strait, restoring freedom of navigation and the flow of international commercial shipping.
Iran’s three primary proxies, Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, entered 2026 in vastly different states of readiness. Israel had killed all of Hamas’s top leadership in Gaza and the vast majority of its battlefield commanders over two years of sustained bombardment.
Israeli strikes killed Hezbollah secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah in September 2024, along with most of the group’s senior command. Hezbollah had privately promised Lebanese officials, including President Joseph Aoun, that it would stay out of the conflict, a commitment the Lebanese cabinet formalized by outlawing Hezbollah’s military and security wings and ordering the deportation of IRGC members from Lebanese soil after Hezbollah broke that promise and rejoined the fighting anyway. The Houthis were the least damaged of the three.
With the U.S. now in a kinetic conflict with Iran, the Houthis’ primary arms supplier and financial backer, the group has not resumed attacks on commercial vessels. As of May 2026, the Houthis had conducted limited attacks on Israel but had not resumed strikes on shipping. Those limited attacks were intercepted, and analysts attributed the subsequent restraint to cost-benefit calculations and fear of drawing the U.S. into another sustained campaign.
Israeli Operation Lucky Drop on August 28, 2025, killed Houthi Prime Minister Ahmed al-Rahawi, along with nine other ministers, the director of the prime minister’s office, and the secretary of the council of ministers. The military chief of staff subsequently died from wounds sustained in the strike. Those losses left the group more cautious and wary of provoking another heavy aerial campaign.
Source: The Gateway Pundit
