The UAE Is America's Friend, Not Rival
by Con Coughlin • January 19, 2022 at 5:00 am
The Houthi attack against the UAE, which has long-standing defence ties with the US... makes a mockery of US President Joe Biden's decision, taken in the first weeks of his presidency, to remove the Houthis from Washington's list of designated terrorist groups....
The Gulf region has become a major battleground between the US and China, not least because American influence is seen as being in decline by Gulf leaders because of Mr Biden's weak and ineffectual leadership, especially in the wake of his administration's disastrous handling of the Afghan withdrawal in the summer.
This has led many Middle Eastern states that have previously adopted pro-Western policies to re-evaluate their long-standing relationship with Washington as they feel, quite rightly, that they can no longer rely on the US to defend their interests, especially when it comes to protecting them against the threat posed by Iran and its allies.
From China's perspective, Abu Dhabi is seen as the "pearl" in its plan to establish what Chinese President Xi Jinping calls the Maritime Silk Road, a project that aims to secure Chinese dominance over key trading routes from Asia to the Middle East and beyond.
The fact that the Biden administration... should be pressuring the UAE over its ties with China is a classic example of how the White House has got its priorities all wrong.
As this week's attack by Iranian-backed terrorists on the UAE graphically illustrates, Iran poses the greatest threat to Gulf security, and it is Washington's failure to support its Gulf allies against the Iranian menace that has led them to develop ties with China in the first place.
If Mr Biden is truly concerned about nations like the UAE developing relations with Beijing, then the best way to reverse this trend would be to offer the Gulf states better protection against Iran. That would be a sure-fire way to get American relations with the Gulf back on track, and keep the opportunistic Chinese communists at bay.
The dramatic drone and missile strikes on the United Arab Emirates (UAE) by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels highlight the utter folly of the Biden administration's willingness to question the loyalty of one of its key Gulf allies.
In what constitutes a serious escalation in the Houthis' terrorist campaign against pro-US Gulf states, the Iranian-backed rebels said they fired five ballistic missiles and "a large number of drones" at Dubai and Abu Dhabi airports, an oil refinery in Musaffah as well as several "sensitive" sites in the UAE.
Abu Dhabi police said three people were killed and six wounded when three fuel tanker trucks exploded in the industrial Musaffah area, near storage facilities run by the country's ADNOC oil conglomerate.
