U.S. Allies in Middle East Turn to Russia on Military

"DUBAI -- Leaked U.S. intelligence documents highlight how military relationships between Russia and U.S. allies in the Middle East have sown discord with Washington.

One document disclosed plans for a Russian defense firm to build a regional maintenance center in the United Arab Emirates for Russian missiles and combat vehicles that the Persian Gulf country had bought, including the possible expansion to service neighboring countries' Russia-origin equipment. Another said the Russian paramilitary group Wagner tried to buy weapons made in Turkey, a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, through "Turkish contacts."

Western diplomats said Turkey's government was unlikely to sell weapons to Wagner, but didn't rule out a black-market deal. Turkey's Defense Industry Agency, which oversees the country's growing weapons industry, said it had no information about the allegations in the leaked documents.

U.S. and Egyptian officials have also responded to a Washington Post report citing a document showing that Egypt, a formal U.S. ally, planned to produce and sell 40,000 rockets to Russia this year. U.S. officials said the plan never materialized, while an Egyptian Foreign Ministry spokesman said the country remained neutral.

The Wall Street Journal wasn't able to independently authenticate the leaked documents, but they contain enough detail to give them credibility. Defense officials have said they believe some of the documents could be authentic, though some appear to have been altered.

The purported documents show how Russia's military heft in the Middle East and North Africa in particular has increasingly garnered attention from American policy makers because of the U.S.'s deep security ties in the region. It adds to worries about how Middle East partners, especially Turkey and the U.A.E., have helped Russia evade Western trade sanctions.

"Having relations with Russia is very much seen through a lens of great-power competition today," said Seth Binder, director of advocacy at D.C.-based nonprofit Project on Middle East Democracy. "The feeling in D.C. is you're with us or against us."

Russian arms exports to Egypt increased 44% in the 2018-to-2022 period versus the 2013-to-2017 period, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. Between 2018 and 2022, Russia made up 19% of Turkey's arms imports, closely tailing Italy and Spain.

The U.A.E.'s political and commercial ties with Russia have deepened over the past decade, although Russia has made up only 5.4% of arms imports by the U.A.E. in recent years, trailing exports from the U.S. and Turkey by a long shot.

The U.S. remains the Middle East's most important security guarantor by orders of magnitude. The U.S. has provided 67.5% of combat aircraft owned by the Middle East and North Africa, reflecting the region's preference and reliance on U.S. technology and security, according to the London-based think tank International Institute for Strategic Studies. France, the U.K. and Russia make up the remainder.

U.S. officials have told Middle East allies that developing economic and political relations with Washington's rivals like Russia and China could be tolerated, but military cooperation was a red line. The U.S. was alarmed when it learned the Chinese were building a military base in Abu Dhabi, which U.A.E. officials put an end to after protests from Washington.

Russia had relatively little military influence in the Middle East until the Arab Spring began shifting the region's alliances more than a decade ago. Since then, Russia has intervened in Syria's civil war, deepened its military cooperation with Iran and developed cordial relations with Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E.

Washington had been Egypt's weapons provider of choice, but that ended after a military coup brought President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi to power in 2013 and the U.S. suspended military assistance to Cairo. Under Mr. Sisi, the Egyptian military has made it a strategy to diversify its purchases by turning to Russia, as well as Europe. Egypt began ordering aircraft from Russia with contracts in 2015 and 2018, according to IISS.

"Egypt's use of Russia as a wedge has been quite deliberate and obvious," said Michael Wahid Hanna, U.S. program director at the International Crisis Group. "Russia is providing hardware with political overtones that have been useful for Sisi."

Washington still provides about $1 billion worth of military aid to Cairo each year." [1]

1. World News: U.S. Allies in Middle East Turn to Russia on Military
Deng, Chao; Kalin, Stephen.  Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]. 17 Apr 2023: A.8.