The United Arab Emirates just announced that, effective May 1, it will leave OPEC, and the significance of this cannot be understated. President Trump approved, calling the move “great” and praising the UAE’s leader for such action. The UAE was the 3rd largest crude oil producer in OPEC, producing 3.82 million barrels per day in 2025. The UAE also operates the entire Habshan-Fujairah oil pipeline/Abu Dhabi Crude Oil Pipeline (ADCOP), which links the emirates of Abu Dhabi and Fujairah, and which was expressly designed to reduce reliance on the Straits of Hormuz. UAE’s withdrawal from OPEC will likely reduce the price of gasoline in the U.S., and position the Emirates as being able to replace the Straits of Hormuz (and Iran) as an energy corridor.
But this is certainly not the first time the UAE has demonstrated its worth in spades to the United States.
Strong US Arms Importer
The UAE is a very dependable supporter of the U.S. defense industry. The UAE’s most recent purchase of U.S. arms, approved in March, includes over $7.5 billion in arms, including long-range discrimination radar and other materials to track ballistic missiles ($4.5 billion), anti-UAV/drone technology ($2.1 billion), air-to-air missiles ($1.22 billion), and F-16 upgrades and munitions ($644 million). Previous sales totaled nearly $30 billion, resulting in the UAE becoming “a net security provider for the region,” according to the State Department. These sales include:
F-35 Joint Strike Fighter aircraft; MQ-9B Remotely Piloted Aircraft; Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles; CH-47F Chinook cargo helicopters; Terminal High Altitude Area Defense missiles; both new and refurbished AH-64E helicopters; Large Aircraft Infrared Countermeasures systems; MK-82, MK-84, GBU-39 Small Diameter Bombs, GBU-58 Paveway II, and KMU-572 JDAM munitions; and AIM-120C8 AMRAAM, AGM-154C JSOW, AGM-154E JSOW-ER, AGM-88E AARGM, Patriot, Javelin, AIM-9X Sidewinder, and AGM-114 Hellfire missiles.
Military and Counterterrorism
The UAE has allowed the U.S. to project enormous power in the Middle East, and against Iran specifically, in ways far beyond arms sales. The U.S.has three bases in the Emirates, including Al Dhafra Air Base (which hosts U.S. Air and Army Forces and approximately 3,500 U.S. personnel), the Al Minhad Air Base, and the Fujairah Naval Base.
The UAE has a proven track record of being an American ally against terrorism — Iran’s axis and beyond. It has been reported that the UAE struck back at Iran for the Islamic Republic’s attacks on it, although the UAE denies it. In April, the UAE dismantled a terrorist cell linked to Iran’s Wilayat Al Faqih, and in March, the UAE dismantled a Hezbollah/Iran terrorist cell, both operating within its borders. In February, the UAE gave $1.2 billion to facilitate President Trump’s peace plan in Gaza and to de-radicalize the enclave from Hamas control.
In February 2019, both President Trump and then Secretary of State Mike Pompeo thanked the UAE for its assistance in returning Danny Burch to the U.S. Burch was a hostage believed to be kidnapped by the Houthis for 18 months, captured in Sanaa in 2017. The UAE has joined with the U.S. in counterterrorism operations, and General Jim Mattis praised the UAE’s leadership in the joint UAE-US 36-hour, 2016 Battle of Mukalla, where the UAE led a counterterrorist operation to liberate the port of Mukalla, Yemen, from Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. The UAE also provided troops for humanitarian aid missions during the U.S. war in Afghanistan.
On its home front, the UAE has designated a host of groups as terrorist organizations, including Al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, the Houthis (the UAE even petitioned the Biden administration to reclassify them as terrorists after the Biden administration took them off the Foreign Terrorist Organization list, while the Trump administration put them back on the list in January 2025), the Islamic State, and the Muslim Brotherhood. This is in stark contrast to Syria, which still allows terror groups to flourish, and Qatar and Iran.
To promote a more tolerant civil society, the UAE has also stood up multiple organizations that seek to de-radicalize its population as well as the greater Muslim world, including: Hedayah, the Global Center for Excellence in Countering Violent Extremism; The Abu Dhabi Forum for Peace; and The Sawab Center. It has also moderated its textbooks on their portrayal of Jews, Christians, and Israel, and promotes inter-faith coexistence through the Abrahamic Family House.
Trade and Investment
The UAE has been the U.S.’s largest Gulf trade partner for almost 20 years. In 2025, the U.S.-UAE trade totaled $39 billion, and the U.S.’s trade surplus with the UAE was at $19.5 billion in 2024, the third largest in the world. U.S. exports to the UAE have far exceeded UAE exports to the U.S. at least since 2016.
In October 2025, the Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund ADQ contributed $600 million out of a $1.8 billion partnership to mine for rare earth minerals and lithium for the U.S. and the West, in an effort to counter Chinese hegemony in this space.
In May 2025, President Trump secured over $200 billion in trade deals with the UAE, including Boeing-GE ($14.5 billion investment from Etihad Airways), a $4 billion primary aluminum smelter project in Oklahoma from Emirates Global Aluminum, an ExxonMobil/Occidental Petroleum/EOG Resources deal with Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) for oil and natural gas production ($60 billion); and an RTX deal with Emirates Global Aluminum and the UAE’s Tawazun Council to help secure the United States’ critical mineral supply. (RELATED: Rare Earths, Real Bottlenecks, and Misguided Policy)
In the wake of tensions from Iran and China, the UAE has benefited the U.S. by assisting in securing international trade. UAE is a member of the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC), which is designed to foster greater transportation and communications links among several countries. Through this group, the UAE serves to both circumvent trade away from the overused Suez Canal and to facilitate trade in the face of Houthi terrorism. The U.S. and UAE have agreed to work together to facilitate greater port and rail infrastructure in the region.
Artificial Intelligence
The UAE continues to make significant investments in American AI. In January 2026, UAE company DAMAC stated that they have already invested $12 billion out of the $20 billion pledged to invest in U.S. data centers that President Trump had announced back in January 2025. Also in January 2026, the UAE joined the Pax Silica, the Department of State’s flagship effort on AI and supply chain security, as its ninth signatory. The Pax Silica currently has 13 members.
U.S.-UAE cooperation in AI does not stop there. According to the U.S.-UAE Business Council,
MGX, along with Microsoft and Blackrock, is a partner on an AI infrastructure investment fund that aims to mobilize up to $100 billion to enhance the future of AI. This includes building data centers in the United States. MGX has separately invested heavily in U.S. AI companies and is a founding member of the Stargate Project, which plans to invest $500 billion in AI infrastructure in the United States.
President Trump brokered the U.S.-UAE AI Acceleration Partnership, signed during the president’s May 2025 visit to the Emirates, which had its inaugural meeting in April 2026. Both the U.S. and UAE inaugurated the 5GW UAE-U.S. AI Campus in May 2025 in Abu Dhabi, where American companies will operate data centers and offer American-managed cloud services throughout the region. In March 2025, the UAE had pledged a 10-year, $1.4 trillion investment in AI infrastructure, semiconductors, energy, quantum computing, biotechnology, and manufacturing in American digital infrastructure.
UAE’s dropping out of OPEC has the ability to fundamentally change the energy geopolitics of the Middle East. Through this action, the UAE continues to demonstrate its worth as a strong investor and force multiplier of the United States.
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