Pentagon warns Middle East turning to China for drone needs
The Pentagon’s in-house intelligence agency says that China is cornering the market on armed drone sales to the Middle East as the United States is stifled by export rules.
China has gained an advantage in the market for armed drone sales to the Middle East as more stringent export restrictions have held back US sales, a Pentagon intelligence report revealed this week.
The Defense Intelligence Agency, the Pentagon’s in-house analysis unit, said that China’s total arms sales around the world totaled $20 billion between 2012 and 2016, as Beijing seeks to build bridges with countries in the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific region in its quest for new markets and natural resources.
“China is a niche supplier of armed UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles] and has sold these systems to several countries in the Middle East, including Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates,” said the Defense Intelligence Agency report released Tuesday. “China faces little competition” for the weapons, the report concludes, because it is not a member of international export control regimes that bind the United States and European arms makers. As a result, while Chinese arms are typically “considered to be of lower quality and reliability,” they come with fewer political strings attached, such as end-use agreements that prevent the retransfer of weapons.
San Diego-based General Atomics, for example, has not yet been able to sell its armed MQ-9 Reaper drone to Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. That sale had been championed by Republicans in Congress, including Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., who represents the district where the drone is manufactured.
