India Bets on a Declining Partner: The Modi-UAE Defence Deal and Its Strategic Missteps |
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Prime Minister Narendra Modi flew into Abu Dhabi on May 15, 2026, his eighth visit to the UAE in 12 years – and emerged with a basketful of agreements. Among them: a framework for a Strategic Defence Partnership, an MoU with Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) for storing up to 30 million barrels in India’s strategic petroleum reserves, a long-term LPG supply deal, and a pledge of $5 billion in Emirati investment. Modi’s aircraft was escorted by UAE military jets on arrival – a choreographed flourish of solidarity.
The defence framework, as described by the Ministry of External Affairs, covers “defence industrial collaboration and cooperation on innovation and advanced technology, training, exercises, maritime security, cyber defence, secure communications and information exchange.” This is, in essence, the language of a Letter of Intent – a political statement about direction, not a binding operational commitment. The hard architecture of any real defence relationship – joint commands, weapons transfers, technology co-development contracts, interoperability protocols – has yet to be negotiated.
India and the UAE have long conducted joint exercises (Desert Cyclone, Desert Flag), and a Letter of Intent for this very partnership had already been signed during UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed’s visit to India in January 2026. The May 15 framework, then, is less a breakthrough than a formalisation of something already politically agreed upon.
The question is whether the political direction itself is wise. There are strong reasons to doubt it.
Siding with the losing bloc – again
The signing came in the middle of an active US-Israeli war on Iran that has shaken the entire West Asian order. The UAE has been struck by more Iranian missiles and drones than any other country during this conflict, including Israel. Iran’s retaliatory closure of the Strait of Hormuz has rocked global energy flows, forced India to raise fuel prices by 3% – its first such hike in four years – and compelled Modi himself to appeal to Indians to conserve fuel and refrain from foreign travel.
In this war, the fault lines are unmistakable. On one side: the United States, Israel, and the UAE – the Abraham Accords bloc. On the other: Iran, backed by Russia and China, with an expanding Islamic coalition that now includes Turkey and elements of West Asian politics increasingly sympathetic to Tehran. The former bloc has not fared well.
The Abraham Accords, once celebrated as a reshaping of the Middle East, now look like what they always were: a set of normalisation agreements stitched together in Washington, whose durability depended entirely on American willingness to absorb the costs.
India has, once again, chosen to align itself with this group. This is not an accident of geography or economics. It is a deliberate political choice – and it follows a pattern. India has consistently backed the US-Israel-Gulf axis even as that axis has stumbled.
Also read: India, UAE Ink Energy Supply, Defence Agreements During Modi’s First Visit to West Asia Amid War
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