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Gulf Leader Tests U.S. Ties With Moves Toward Russia, China
President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed has positioned the U.A.E. as a friend to all sides since Moscow invaded Ukraine—but not without a cost
ABU DHABI—Last year, the United Arab Emirates became a hub for Russian money and cut oil production, boosting Moscow’s war chest and drawing protests from Washington. The country’s leader skipped a call from President Biden as the U.S. rallied support for Ukraine.
Now, Emirati President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan is preparing for a state visit to Washington, and the U.S. and U.A.E. are hammering out a formal agreement on defense and commerce after jointly committing $100 billion for clean-energy projects—a major Biden administration goal. All the while, the Emiratis have expanded ties with Russia and another U.S. rival, China.
Sheikh Mohamed and the U.A.E. have emerged as winners from the geopolitical reordering since Russia invaded Ukraine in February last year, but not without a cost. A friends-with-everyone strategy has tested relations with the petrostate’s biggest ally, the U.S., as Sheikh Mohamed takes a leadership role in a new Middle East that is closer to Russia and China.
In rare interviews, senior Emirati officials said Sheikh Mohamed, known by his initials MBZ, doesn’t see the U.A.E.’s close U.S. relationship precluding ties with Moscow or Beijing. Instead, they say, such ties can help Washington.
“We are not going to be defined by great-power rivalry,” said Anwar Gargash, his foreign-policy adviser.
For instance, last October, Sheikh Mohamed met Russian President Vladimir Putin one-on-one in St. Petersburg, where he reinforced U.S. interest in a prisoner swap for WNBA star Brittney Griner and offered to assist in the exchange, people familiar with the matter said. Eight weeks later, Ms.
Griner was freed at an Emirati air base in exchange for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout.
A senior Biden administration official said the White House has watched Sheikh Mohamed make inroads in recent years with Russia and China that have frayed the U.A.E.’s relationship with Washington. U.S. officials have warned him that cooperating too closely with those countries on military and intelligence matters would imperil relations with America.
The official said that Sheikh Mohamed has consulted U.S. officials about Russia and China more in recent months and that Washington’s relations with him are improving. Before and after visiting Russia, for example, he spoke with U.S. and United Nations officials and later called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. National security adviser Jake Sullivan praised Emirati efforts at de-escalation in the region in a speech this month that laid out Biden administration policy in the Middle East.
Washington counts the U.A.E. as a key partner in fighting terrorism and stabilizing global energy markets, with massive investments in the U.S. Sheikh Mohamed normalized relations with America’s top Middle East ally, Israel, in 2020.
The U.S. has been the U.A.E.’s most important foreign ally since the country’s founding in 1971, when Sheikh Mohamed’s father united seven independent emirates. Over the past decade, the soft-spoken 62-year-old has charted rapid economic expansion, liberalized society and buttressed authoritarian rulers across the Middle East, including developing stronger ties with Iran and Syria.
In recent years, he has navigated a rocky relationship with the U.S.
Construction of a secret Chinese military base near Abu Dhabi nearly upended the U.S. relationship in 2021. Sheikh Mohamed stopped the project under pressure from the U.S. government, a senior Biden administration official said. Emirati officials said they believed it was a purely commercial port.
Growing ties to China have clouded the sale of advanced F-35 jet fighters to the U.A.E., and the U.S. protested the country hiring China’s Huawei Technologies to build out its 5G network.
Twice in the past seven months, the U.A.E., through the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, has cut oil output in coordination with Moscow, despite U.S. objections. U.S. officials have also warned the U.A.E. repeatedly against helping Moscow evade sanctions as Russians flock to Dubai to trade oil, buy property and hide money. The U.S. and European Union have sanctioned Emirati companies that facilitate Russian oil trades and supply Moscow’s industrial base.
But higher oil prices and a property-market boom fueled partly by wealthy Russians have driven Emirati economic expansion. U.S. and Emirati officials say Sheikh Mohamed forged a more independent foreign policy as he watched American policy seesaw over four administrations.
“The tone of the relationship has changed. It’s no longer one where D.C. picks up the phone and tells Abu Dhabi what to do and Abu Dhabi just follows suit,” said Dina Esfandiary, senior Middle East adviser at the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think tank, and author of a book on the U.A.E.
“The flip side of that is that sometimes the U.A.E. is not going to get what it asks from the U.S., because it hasn’t just done what the Americans wanted,” she said.
Emirati officials say they have felt unsure about America’s commitment since strikes in 2019 on Saudi oil fields and tankers in Gulf waters were blamed on Iran and met with no public response. Before that, Emirati officials say they were blindsided by the Obama administration’s secret talks with Iran that led to the 2015 nuclear deal, which the U.A.E. opposed.
They also complained about Washington’s response to January 2022 drone and missile attacks by Yemen’s Houthi rebels against Abu Dhabi, which they viewed as an existential threat.
The U.A.E.’s wealth is built not only on oil but also its status in a volatile region as a haven for finance, logistics and tourism. It brooks no dissent and maintains a pervasive security state, enabling a country of only about one million citizens to host eight million foreigners.
“This whole model is dependent on the safety, security and stability of people, flow of goods and commodities,” said Lana Nusseibeh, the U.A.E.’s ambassador to the U.N.
At Sheikh Mohamed’s palace, messages flooded in after the 2022 attacks from world leaders offering sympathy and solidarity. Mr. Biden didn’t call.
A couple of weeks later, the U.S. sent jet fighters and a guided-missile destroyer. When a senior American commander visited, Sheikh Mohamed refused to meet. Weeks later, he didn’t take Mr. Biden’s call on Ukraine, The Wall Street Journal reported.
American officials say they underestimated the threat perceived by the U.A.E. One official cited the use of U.S.-supplied weapons to defend against the attacks as proof of Washington’s security commitment.
In his talk with Mr. Biden last July on the sidelines of a regional summit, Sheikh Mohamed put aside prepared remarks to make a personal appeal. He expressed frustration with what he sees as the U.S. abandoning its security guarantees and reminded Mr. Biden that Emirati troops have fought alongside the U.S. for 30 years, people familiar with the matter said.
Sheikh Mohamed told the president he needed help understanding where he was coming from, the people said. Mr. Biden invited him to Washington, where they are expected to pledge cooperation on security, energy, business and religious tolerance.
Sultan Al Jaber, a cabinet minister who oversees industrial and climate policy and runs the national oil company, said the U.A.E. wants the U.S. relationship to grow but not at the expense of other countries. “So it’s the U.S., it’s India, it’s Europe, it’s Russia, it’s China,” and others, he said.
Sheikh Mohamed began deepening ties with China years ago, but the two countries grew closer during the Covid-19 pandemic, when the U.A.E. opened its borders while much of the world closed them.
It produced face masks with machines sourced from China, PCR tests in partnership with China’s leading genetics company and vaccines in cooperation with China’s Sinopharm, which was more willing than Western manufacturers to work with it, Emirati officials said.
U.A.E.-China trade exceeds $70 billion and goes far beyond oil, expanding into finance, technology and cultural exchange.
The U.A.E.’s interests have also aligned with Russia’s.
In February 2022, Abu Dhabi declined to vote on a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, as it sought Russian favor for another resolution labeling the Houthis a terrorist organization.
The abstention hurt early U.S. efforts to isolate Russia. Ms. Nusseibeh said it came as the U.A.E. prepared to hold the security-council presidency and sought to mediate the conflict. On March 2 last year, the U.A.E. voted for a U.N. General Assembly resolution demanding Russia end the war.
U.A.E. investment funds have put billions of dollars in Russia, and Sheikh Mohamed invested in personal ties with Mr. Putin, meeting with him regularly over the past two decades.
Sheikh Mohamed has “been very, very patient building this relationship with Russia,” said Mr. Gargash.
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