National Review reported Tuesday that the Biden administration would be redesignating the Houthis a terrorist organization.

Zach Kessel wrote:

The United States is expected to return Yemen’s Houthi militia — an Iranian proxy group — to its list of designated terrorist organizations after attacks on commercial and military ships in the Red Sea.

The U.S. State Department removed the Houthis from the list in February 2021, arguing that “the designations could have a devastating impact on Yemenis’ access to basic commodities like food and fuel.”

What we didn’t know at the time was that Biden wasn’t reinstating the previous FTO (foreign terrorist organization) designation used by the Trump administration. Instead, President Biden is taking the coward’s route by employing a weaker designation called SDGT (specially designated global terrorist) while being able to claim that he’s taking the Houthi threat seriously.

Jennifer Hansler explains the FTO and SDGT designations for CNN:

As of Tuesday, the administration was not reimposing the FTO designation.

Both the SDGT and FTO designations trigger an asset freeze, but only an FTO designation imposes immigration restrictions on members, according to the State Department. The SDGT designation also does not impose sanctions on those who provide “material support” to the group.

In short, Biden’s SDGT ploy allows him plausible deniability concerning inaction while also ensuring that U.S. strength cannot be applied to Houthi forces in any real capacity besides telegraphed and ineffective air strikes against a rebel force that has made a living of dodging similar Saudi strikes for years.

While writing about the third U.S. strike against Houthi forces, the New York Times reports that following the coalition strikes against Houthi facilities, the terrorist organization retained “about three-quarters of their ability to fire missiles and drones at ships.” (Do keep in mind that these claims come from yet-to-be-named U.S. officials.)

Eric Schmitt and Saeed Al-Batati write for the Times:

A confidential Pentagon analysis of the first barrage suggests otherwise. While the U.S.-led strikes damaged or destroyed about 90 percent of the targets that were struck, the Houthis retained about three-quarters of their ability to fire missiles and drones at ships, two U.S. officials said on Saturday.

The damage estimates are the first detailed assessments of the strikes against nearly 30 locations in Yemen last week. They reveal the serious challenges the Biden administration and its allies face as they try to deter the Houthis from retaliating, secure critical shipping routes between Europe and Asia and contain the spread of regional conflict.

The Biden administration has no capacity to act because its namesake, even at his best, was incapable of anything approaching competency in war. Dotage, a desire to protect his shared legacy with Barack Obama regarding Iran, and the discordant opinions of his aides and caretakers, means the best we can hope for are reactionary promises married to half-measures.