WASHINGTON — U.S. forces have struck more than 1,000 targets in President Donald Trump’s campaign against Houthi militants in Yemen, the Pentagon said, offering rare insight into a stepped-up offensive that’s been conducted largely in secret.

Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell disclosed the latest figure in an email that touted the Pentagon’s accomplishments during Trump’s first 100 days in office. The strikes have killed “Houthi fighters and leaders, including senior Houthi missile and UAV officials” while “degrading their capabilities,” Parnell said, using the acronym for unmanned aerial vehicles.

The Trump administration has been tight-lipped about the campaign against the Houthis except to contend that it’s been far more intense than strikes launched against the Iran-backed group by the Biden administration. The U.S. has targeted the Houthis since they began to attack commercial shipping in the Red Sea in response to Israel’s campaign against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

In a statement two days ago, U.S. Central Command said the U.S. has intentionally declined to disclose details to preserve operational security.

The aggressive campaign has stirred accusations that the U.S. isn’t doing enough to avoid civilian casualties in the Yemen campaign, known as Operation Rough Rider. The Yemen Data Project, a nonprofit group that tracks the campaign, said earlier this month that the campaign had killed 500 civilians so far.

On April 18, Houthi-controlled health authorities said a U.S. strike on a Yemen oil port killed at least 74 people, most of them port workers.

The strikes against the Houthis were the subject of a Signal group chat that was disclosed earlier this month after Atlantic magazine editor Jeffrey Goldberg was inadvertently included among the participants. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth came under sharp criticism after disclosing details of the impending Houthi attack plans in that chat and in a separate Signal group that included his wife and brother.

The chat revealed by Goldberg also exposed divisions within the administration. Vice President JD Vance said he thought the strikes would be a mistake because only 3% of U.S. trade runs through the Suez Canal in contrast to 40% of European trade. He said he hated “bailing Europe out again.”

“I am not sure the president is aware how inconsistent this is with his message on Europe right now,” Vance wrote.

Other conservatives have also come out against the campaign on the argument that it’s draining stockpiles of munitions that should be kept in reserve in case of war with China or another adversary.

Last year, well before Trump won reelection, the Heritage Foundation’s Jim Fein argued that the U.S. was running low and the munitions would be better spent elsewhere.

“The US needs those munitions,” Fein wrote. “The Houthis are a comparatively small, less advanced, and less lethal threat than China, yet they’ve proven to be a persistent problem for the US and its allies. If it takes hundreds of missiles to blunt Houthi attacks — with limited success — it will take even more to face the threat from China.”

In the article, Fein didn’t conclude that the U.S. shouldn’t bomb Houthi targets.

(Courtney McBride and Tony Capaccio contributed to this report.)

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