United Arab Emirates still want to increase production of its defense and security industry 1903133

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Defence News - United Arab Emirates
 
 
Tuesday, March 19, 2013, 10:40 AM
 
United Arab Emirates still want to increase production of its defense and security industry.
The United Arab Emirates, increasingly a major military power in the Persian Gulf, is stepping up efforts to develop its own defense industry. In large part, it's doing this by making Western defense companies set up high-tech projects in the federation as a condition of lucrative arms contracts to diversify its economy from a dependence on oil and gas exports.
     

The latest generation of NIMR 6x6 armoured vehicle personnel carrier at IDEX 2013 Defence Exhibition in United Arab Emirates.
     

United Arab Emirates is by far the most advanced in establishing its own defense industry, even more so than Saudi Arabia, the most powerful of the gulf monarchies, on the back of the billions of dollars they have spent on buying Western weapons systems.

A sizable proportion of the so-called offset defense manufacturing projects established in the Abu Dhabi and Dubai, respectively the economic and financial powerhouses of the Emirates, stem from major defense and aviation exhibitions they stage annually.

The 11th biennial International Defense Exposition, known as IDEX, in Abu Dhabi in February produced contracts worth $20 billion.

The Emirates' effort to secure offset deals has been boosted by the focus of Western defense contractors on foreign sales to compensate for stringent cuts in domestic defense spending by Western governments.

The United Arab Emirates, the world's fourth largest arms importer and riding on the back of high oil and gas revenues, is expected to spend nearly $13 billion on defense over the next three years compared to $9.3 billion in 2011.

The federation has several joint venture deals with global defense giants such as Lockheed Martin and the Boeing Co. of the United States.

A couple of months ago, the Tawazun defense company, owned by the Abu Dhabi government and a creation of the military offset program, announced a deal with Sweden's Saab to build advanced radar systems in the Emirates.

On Feb. 21, the last day of this year's IDEX, the Emirates military announced it would buy 1,000 of Tawazun's high mobility Nimr armored tactical vehicles designed for desert operations.

The Nimr is the first piece of military hardware system built entirely in the Emirates.