More capable missiles could help Saudi Arabia to deter attacks by Iran and make its military more self-reliant, while possibly strengthening its position in a deadly conflict with Yemen’s Tehran-backed Houthi fighters.

But they risk fueling a regional missile race and could deepen opposition in the U.S. Congress to a U.S.-Saudi civilian nuclear agreement that has already raised concerns about proliferation.

Satellite company Planet Labs, based in the U.S., took images of the al-Duwadimi complex about 125 miles west of Riyadh between April 2025 and September 2026.

The two researchers, Sam Lair and Michael Duitsman of the Foreign Policy Research Institute, assessed that those images show a new building that houses casting pits — wells in which a mixture of fuel ingredients is poured into missile motor casings and allowed to harden.

The Saudi embassy and Information Ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

The building, flanked by what appear to be walls to protect nearby structures from accidental explosions, is at least twice as large as the one believed to house the plant’s existing casting pits, Lair and Duitsman said in their assessment. The Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI) is a non-partisan research organization in Philadelphia.

A second new building could be used to store fuel ingredients or finished missile components, they said.

The imagery “suggests that Saudi Arabia is expanding the infrastructure at the missile production complex, likely to produce larger missiles which could deliver larger payloads or reach longer ranges,” they wrote.

Militaries favor solid-fuel missiles because they can be stored for long periods and launched more quickly than liquid-fuel systems.

Lair and Duitsman and experts from the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) and the CNA research and analysis organization told Reuters that the makeup of Saudi Arabia’s missile force suggests that the al-Duwadimi complex relies on Chinese technology. Lair and Duitsman said that its characteristics are also similar to Chinese missile plants.

Saudi Arabia secretly acquired about 40 liquid-fuel DF-3 ballistic missiles from China in 1987, according to a 1991 declassified CIA estimate. It displayed two of them for the first time in an April 2014 military parade, according to a YouTube video and photographs of the event.

The FPRI team also recently identified from social media videos and photos what they assessed was the wreckage in Yemen of a Saudi-fired Chinese-designed DF-15 missile.

Lair said the kingdom may now be producing the solid-fuel DF-15, and that the expansion of a1-Dumadimi is likely for the production of the longer-range DF-21 or a similar missile.

Riyadh is believed to have turned to Beijing because Washington has long restricted exports of longer-range missile systems.

The Chinese embassy and defense ministry did not respond to requests for comment. The CIA declined to comment. The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

Missiles would alter the balance of power

Sascha Bruchmann, a research fellow at IISS, said longer-range missiles would allow Saudi Arabia to strike Iran without risking its U.S.-supplied F-15 jet fighters against Iranian air defenses.

“You’d want a system to threaten whatever is holy to Tehran … if you don’t have the political will to send an F-15 with JDAMs over Tehran,” said Bruchmann, referring to U.S.-made satellite-guided bombs. “Iran has a lead because its missiles and drones can strike Saudi wherever it wants. The Saudis could close that capability gap a bit.”

Bruchmann, who reviewed the FPRI analysis at Reuters request, concurred that the expansion of al-Duwadimi could be for producing more powerful solid-fuel missiles.

Janes, the defense intelligence company, also reviewed it and said the buildings “may suggest an effort to expand production capability or support the development of longer-range missiles.”

Saudi Arabia’s apparent pursuit of more powerful missiles comes as other Gulf powers are also seeking to expand their offensive and defensive arsenals, said Decker Eveleth, a CNA analyst who has been tracking the al-Duwadimi construction with commercial satellite imagery and concurred with the FPRI assessment.

“This is being replicated across the Middle East,” he said. “You see exactly the same thing happening in the UAE. You see the exact same thing happening in Turkey. Everybody is doing this now.”

The expansion of al-Duwadimi could have political consequences in the US by stiffening bipartisan congressional opposition to a US-Saudi agreement under which the US would help Riyadh establish uranium enrichment for power generation.

Opponents say that the deal lacks sufficient safeguards to prevent Riyadh from secretly building a nuclear weapon. The kingdom has denied any such plan.

Work began last year

The FPRI assessment said the Planet Labs imagery showed that the expansion at al-Duwadimi began in April 2025 with ground-clearing and digging for the suspected storage building. Work on the suspected casting-pit building began later that month or in early May, it said.

A December 12, 2025, photo showed what researchers assessed were two deep pits inside the building that had no roof yet.

A Sept. 18, 2026, photo shows the roof still partly missing and “heavy duty blast diverting walls” on either side to prevent accidental explosions from damaging adjacent structures.

The walls, the researchers said, are somewhat similar to those depicted in imagery of US and Iranian missile plants and “further evidence the building is for casting solid propellant motors.”

Finishing the roofs would not take long, the FPRI said, but installing casting equipment may take several months. The facility could be ready to start producing missiles as early as the end of the year.

Doron Spielman, a spokesperson for the prime minister, later confirmed to Reuters that Netanyahu had met with Hegseth at the Uvda Air Force Base in Israel’s southern Negev desert region.

Netanyahu and Hegseth discussed “the threats in the region” and the U.S.-Israel partnership in dealing both offensively and defensively with those threats, he said in a brief phone call.

Hegseth also thanked Israel for hosting U.S. forces, which Spielman said numbered in the thousands, and discussed President Donald Trump’s support for the prime minister.

“There’s a deep personal relationship here that was at the core of this discussion,” Spielman said.

On Sunday, Trump endorsed Netanyahu in next week’s parliamentary election in Israel, the country’s first ballot since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on southern Israel.

The Pentagon has not publicly commented on Hegseth’s visit.

Hegseth earlier posted on X that he had visited U.S. service members in the Central Command area of responsibility, which covers the Middle East, northeast Africa and parts of Asia.

He did not specify where he had met with the forces.

Hegseth’s visit comes as tensions flare between the U.S. and Iran over the Strait of Hormuz and as Yemen’s Iran-allied Houthis intensify their attacks on Saudi Arabia.

U.S. and Israeli forces launched joint strikes against Iran in late February, setting off the wider Middle East war. Netanyahu told Israeli media this month that he’s not seeking to attack Iran before the Oct. 27 Israeli election. Trump has said he will not attack Iran before U.S. midterm elections in November.

Israel has hosted additional U.S. forces, including military aircraft, since at least February as part of the war with Iran.

The deal secures the advanced variant of the helicopter, with scheduled delivery at the beginning of the next decade. It follows months of uncertainty surrounding the deal’s viability, caused by the Israeli government’s inability to finalize the pact despite multiple offer extensions granted by the Americans.

An agreement was previously stalled due to a dispute between the Israeli ministry of finance and the Israeli ministry of defense over funding sources. The ministry of finance demanded budget adjustments and a defined funding source, while the defense establishment pressed to approve the procurement as “urgent,” regardless of general budget discussions.

This gridlock persisted even as the U.S. granted Israel several extensions, culminating in a deadline of Oct. 7, 2026. After missing this original window, concerns arose in Israel that Boeing’s production slot would be routed to other international customers, leading to delivery delays and price increases.

In a last-minute move, Israeli defense officials reached out to their U.S. counterparts and requested another extension. The Americans agreed and opened what Israeli officials conveyed to the press here as a “final window” on the condition that the deal be signed immediately. This prompted an urgent Israeli Cabinet phone vote on Wednesday, which approved the necessary budgetary source at the expense of another long-term, non-defense national program, and made the signing of the deal possible at the same day.

The AH-64E Apache “Echo” is a twin-engine, tandem-seat attack helicopter. The aircraft’s integrated weapon and targeting suite accommodates a payload of up to 16 Hellfire missiles, 76 2.75-inch rockets, and an M230-series 30mm automatic chain gun supplied with up to 1,200 rounds of ammunition.

The platform incorporates digital network connectivity via Link 16, manned-unmanned teaming capabilities for drone control, and a modular open systems approach designed to allow the integration of hardware and software modifications.

Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., visited the Middle East this week on a Congressional Delegation trip, speaking with Gulf region leaders and visiting American facilities to assess damage done by the Iran war. Murphy was denied access to Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar, which had suffered damage from drone strikes during the conflict.

“They are using every tool they can, including withholding information about damages, slow walking the pace of reports about casualties and denying us access to see the damage as part of a campaign of cover-up, so as to mask the true cost of the war,” Murphy told reporters on Thursday.

The “unprecedented” base denial prepared Murphy, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and Defense Appropriations Committee, in the coming days to draft language that would explicitly require the Department of Defense to grant members of Congress access to military bases overseas under all circumstances if needed.

“I don’t have any illusions that that’s going to pass between now and the end of the year, but I think that’ll be a really important part of the discussion around an appropriations bill next year and the defense authorization bill,” he said during the press call.

Prior to his trip, Murphy requested access to the base through a letter and direct appeal to U.S. Central Command leadership. But he was denied access even as the Department of State supported his trip to the region, with the Defense Department saying it was due to previously imposed travel restrictions.

“Senator Murphy’s office was informed before his trip to the Middle East that he would not receive Department of War support to access Al Udeid Air Base, consistent with the Secretary of War’s directive on travel restrictions in the region ordered on March 3, 2026,” a senior Defense Department official told Military Times on Thursday.

“That decision was communicated in advance by the Office of the Secretary of War for Legislative Affairs,” the official continued. “The Department applies the Secretary’s guidance evenly.”

In early March, the State and Defense departments issued travel guidance, calling on Americans to depart areas in the region and updating its travel advisory to recommend against visiting certain countries, including Qatar.

“It is absolutely ordinary for members of Congress to travel to areas of conflict and get to talk directly to the military leaders and the soldiers that are involved in the conflict and see for ourselves the damage that has been done to our bases and equipment,” Murphy said, highlighting how during the Iraq and Afghanistan wars he was able to visit operating bases.

He argued that since Congress decides funding and authorization for war, it is necessary to see the consequences, but he was unable to visit Al Udeid or have a briefing on the war with American military officials while in the region.

On the same day the travel advisory was issued in March, the U.S. embassy in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, was hit ​by two Iranians drones, resulting in building damage and a fire. Murphy said that the drones impacted multiple floors of the embassy and part of the space is now “uninhabitable” with permanent damage.

The U.S. previously announced in 2023 plans to build a new embassy compound in Riyadh, which Murphy attributes the lack of repairs to.

Even though no injuries or casualties were reported from the strike, Murphy said that if the attack happened during the day it would have killed many Americans.

“[Secretary of Defense Pete] Hegseth is determined to hide the cost and the consequences of this war from the American public, and it is absolutely outrageous that I and Republican senators are being denied the ability to see the damage for ourselves,” he said.

Turkey, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia signed the Mecca Joint Defence Agreement in August, under which an armed attack on one member is considered an attack on all. The three countries have since held political and military meetings in response to the Houthi attacks.

On Monday, the countries said they had agreed to move immediately to implement their collective defense commitments and ensure the “rapid deployment” of military forces and capabilities in Saudi Arabia.

Speaking at a joint press conference with his Hungarian counterpart Anita Orban in Ankara, Fidan stressed that the pact was defensive rather than offensive, saying military officials were assessing possible contributions, particularly in air defense, electronic warfare and technical support.

“Yemen’s legitimate government forces are already continuing the battle on the ground and Saudi Arabia is supporting them,” Fidan said.

“But this is a defensive agreement. When a country party to the pact comes under attack, you stand by it in its defense. This is not an offensive agreement. Turkey will not send troops to another country to carry out attacks on its territory,” he said.

Fidan said military delegations would determine Saudi Arabia’s operational defense needs and what contributions Turkey and Pakistan could make.

On Wednesday, two officials told Reuters that Turkey was sending mainly defensive and technical support to Saudi Arabia to help its fight with Houthi militants.

Turkish officials have said any support provided at this stage would largely be in a bilateral capacity, as Turkey’s parliament has not officially ratified the joint defense pact.

Fidan said on Thursday that work was largely completed for the agreement to be submitted for parliament’s approval and that they aimed to send it “as soon as possible.”

Turkey, which has NATO’s second-largest army and a robust defense industry, has condemned the Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia, voiced willingness to help meet Riyadh’s technical military needs, and agreed to join a Saudi-led coalition to ensure navigational safety in the Red Sea.

The government’s armed forces would press the offensive “until the country is liberated from the grip of the terrorist militia,” Yemeni President Rashad al-Alimi said in a televised address. A military spokesman later called on the Houthis to lay down their weapons.

The Houthis, known formally as Ansar Allah, have held Yemen’s capital Sanaa and vast parts of the northwest, where most of the population live, since 2014. They have so far withstood a series of attacks over the years by Saudi Arabia, the UAE and their Western allies, and have updated their weaponry with the help of Iran.

The movement launched a surprise offensive last month which captured the strategic Bab el-Mandeb strait and some 90 miles of coast on the Red Sea in a matter of weeks, giving the Houthis new leverage over the international shipping route.

That advance also opened a new front in the wider U.S.-Israeli war launched in February against Iran, to which Tehran’s responses included choking oil shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, to the other side of the Arabian Peninsula.

HOUTHIS SAY THEY STRUCK SAUDI ARABIA

As the Yemeni government, known as the Presidential Leadership Council, made its announcement, the Houthis said they had launched ballistic missiles and drones at Saudi Aramco sites in Riyadh and the Khurais area of Saudi Arabia.

They claimed the attacks caused major fires and were in response to what they said were 50 Saudi-led air and missile strikes in Yemen in the past 12 hours.

There was no immediate confirmation from Saudi Arabia.

Alimi said the decision to launch the counteroffensive came after all chances of de-escalating the conflict had been exhausted.

He thanked Saudi Arabia for its support and called on Yemen’s regional allies and international partners to support PLC forces and institutions.

Regional and Western officials told Reuters earlier this week that Saudi Arabia and its Yemeni allies were planning to launch an assault on the Houthis, with the Saudis leading aerial combat and Yemeni forces fighting on the ground.

NEW FRONT IN MIDEAST WAR

The U.S. is already providing intelligence to support Riyadh’s operations in Yemen, while some regional and European nations are providing mainly defensive military aid to the kingdom, six people with knowledge of the Saudi preparations told Reuters.

The United States’ war on Iran has decimated a layer of Iranian military and political leadership, but has also entangled Washington in a new engagement in the Middle East and depleted crucial military hardware.

Yemen has been mired in conflict for years, with an array of local armed groups and factions backed by competing regional and international actors.

After a popular uprising that was part of the Arab Spring movements in 2011, the Houthis, an armed group of Zaidi Shi’ite Muslims, captured Sanaa.

The Saudi-backed PLC, which is also recognized by the United Nations, has, since the Houthi takeover, controlled the south and east of the country, based in the former South Yemen capital of Aden.

Saudi Arabia entered Yemen’s civil war in 2015 at the head of an Arab coalition in support of the PLC, but failed to defeat the Houthis.

A truce agreed between the warring parties in 2022 largely held until this year, when the Houthis launched missile and drone attacks on Saudi shipping and oil infrastructure in a spillover from the Iran war.

HOUTHIS ON FRONT FOOT

The Houthis have maintained the initiative on the ground since seizing control of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait in their lightning offensive last month that saw government forces collapse.

Bab el-Mandeb is the southern exit passage of the Red Sea, a key shipping route between the Mediterranean and Asia that has assumed even more importance this year as an alternative to the Strait of Hormuz.

In the last 48 hours, the Houthis have also made gains against government and local forces on strategic hilltops near Yemen’s Taiz, military sources said, advancing on the last road between the city and Aden on the southern coast.

Houthi control over the Taiz-Aden road would lead to an effective siege of the city, Yemen’s third-largest, inhabited by hundreds of thousands of civilians and where thousands of government forces are also stationed.

The city is important not just for its strategic location; Alimi is from the region, and a siege of Taiz would amplify an already-dire humanitarian situation in the country.

Three in four ​families in parts of Yemen are going hungry from the impact of the surge in fighting, ‌which has displaced tens of thousands of people and disrupted supplies to millions, the World Food Programme said last week.

The operation, expected to be launched in the coming weeks, will be led by Yemeni forces on the ground, which are overseen by Riyadh, and supported by Saudi air strikes, according to six people with knowledge of the preparations.

While the US is already providing intelligence to support Riyadh’s operations in Yemen, and some regional and European nations are providing mainly defensive military aid to the kingdom, the Saudi allies aren’t expected to play a direct role in combat operations, said the people who requested anonymity to discuss security matters.

Saudi Arabia entered neighboring Yemen’s civil war in 2015 at the head of an Arab coalition in support of the internationally recognized government, which the Houthis had driven out of the capital Sanaa. A truce agreed between the warring parties in 2022 largely held until this year, when the Houthis launched missile and drone attacks on Saudi shipping and oil infrastructure in a spillover from the Iran war.

A key objective of the planned Saudi offensive, which hasn’t been previously reported, is aimed at reversing the rapid gains made by the Houthis last month when they advanced down the coast and seized control of the Bab el-Mandeb strait, according to people with knowledge of the plans who include Gulf and Yemeni officials and Western diplomats.

The Saudis are considering two options for the assault, the Gulf and Yemeni officials said: either a narrowly focused attack around Bab el-Mandeb or a broader offensive that also includes synchronized attacks on multiple fronts around Yemen, in the governorates of Al-Bayda, Marib, Taiz and Al-Jawf.

More than 100,000 Yemeni troops could be mobilized in the offensive, depending on the scale, the officials all said.

Spokespeople for the Saudi and Yemeni governments, the Houthi group and the US military didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment about the Saudi plans.

Bab el-Mandeb is the southern exit passage of the Red Sea, a key shipping route between the Mediterranean and Asia that’s assumed even more importance this year as an alternative to the Strait of Hormuz, which has been effectively closed by the Iran conflict.

Riyadh has concluded it cannot enter new Yemeni peace negotiations with the Houthis while the militants remain in control of Bab el-Mandeb, giving them significant global leverage, the Western diplomats and Gulf official said.

The six people with knowledge of the Saudi preparations couldn’t give a precise timing for the launch of the offensive, with their estimates ranging from within a week to after the US midterm elections in early November.

Michael Ratney, a former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia, said he expected an offensive to be narrowly focused and certainly more modest in scope than the Saudi-led operation in 2015 that sought to rout the militants.

“As much [as] they want to vanquish the Houthis completely, they also need to get back to status quo ante before Houthis controlled territory along Bab el-Mandeb,” he added. “Ideally, it would be a fairly limited operation to retake coastal areas and get back to normal maritime traffic.”

The Houthis have become Iran’s most formidable ally in the Middle East since Israel’s degradation of Hezbollah in Lebanon over the past three years.

A Saudi-directed offensive against the group would mark a new flashpoint in a region engulfed by conflict since the Hamas-led attacks on Israel of Oct. 7, 2023, and the subsequent US-Israeli war on Iran.

TRUMP, TURKEY AND PAKISTAN

Washington, Saudi Arabia’s most powerful ally, is providing military advisers and intelligence, including targeting information, to support Saudi air operations in Yemen, according to one of the Western diplomats.

However, the extent of support may be limited. Reuters has previously reported that US President Donald Trump rebuffed requests by the de facto Saudi ruler Mohammed bin Salman for direct military support such as air strikes.

Turkey and Pakistan, with whom Saudi Arabia signed a joint defense agreement last month, have provided military equipment that the kingdom is using in Yemen, Pakistani and regional officials said.

Last month, Pakistan sent four cargo planes with equipment including air defense systems, light artillery, drones and anti-drone systems to Aden, the seat of Yemen’s Saudi-backed government, a Pakistani government official said.

Pakistani military advisers are also on the ground with Saudi counterparts to support Yemeni forces, according to a second Pakistani official, the Gulf official and a Western diplomat. Turkish drones, bought by Saudi Arabia before the current war, have also been deployed over Yemen, they added.

One of the kingdom’s key concerns in launching a new offensive in Yemen is how to protect its oil facilities and other infrastructure from Houthi drone and missile attacks, according to regional officials who said Riyadh has asked several allies for help with defensive systems.

Pakistan has deployed between 30,000 and 40,000 troops to Saudi Arabia to help defend the kingdom’s land borders and help with drone and missile interceptions, according to the second Pakistani official, who said the troops arrived in waves beginning last year but also after the recent escalation. Islamabad hasn’t made any decision to send troops into Yemen in a fighting capacity, the official said.

The Pakistani and Turkish defense ministries didn’t respond to requests for comment on their military support for Riyadh.

France, meanwhile, has announced it will send defensive systems and troops to Saudi Arabia to help protect the Red Sea port ‌city of Yanbu.

FRACTURED YEMENI FORCES

Any ground operation inside Yemen will rely on the disparate coalition of Yemeni fighting factions that Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates armed and trained at earlier stages of the civil war when the conflict ground to a bloody stalemate.

“Many anti-Houthi forces are still not organized or prepared for the kind of sustained offensive required to push back a disciplined Houthi military force. And they are being tested right now, as the Houthis apply pressure across several fronts at once,” said Yemen analyst Mohammed Albasha.

Yemeni forces were further fractured last winter when southern fighters backed by the UAE tried to take territory in the east and announce secession plans, leading to their defeat by Saudi-backed fighters after a series of clashes.

Ali Shihabi, a Saudi political analyst close to government thinking, cautioned that the outcome of any offensive by the Saudis against the Houthis would depend on how ground forces perform.

“The priority so far has been to defend the positions on the ground and stabilize the front, but certainly they will be going on the offensive,” he said. “Success greatly depends on the quality of the performance of the local forces.”

Analysis of thousands of flight records as well as gigabytes of leaked internal company documents, aviation filings and emails suggest a link between the sanctioned aircraft and more than 100 missions flown on behalf of the UAE government and its royal family since mid-2025.

The Russian company behind these planes, Aviacon Zitotrans, has been sanctioned by the United States, Canada and Ukraine for its support in Russia’s war effort. Previous reporting also revealed its role in sustaining Moscow’s mercenaries in Africa. The specific planes that pop up in the flight logs of UAE’s operations have been separately designated as blocked property by the U.S. government.

This article is the second in a multi-part series that uncovers the peculiar network of front companies, airlines and Soviet-era freight planes.

The UAE’s apparent use of a military-linked Russian cargo airline, alongside its role as a hub for Russian sanctions circumvention, runs contrary to Western efforts to isolate Moscow internationally and cut the Kremlin off from cash flows it needs to maintain its war against Ukraine.

Flight tracks collected by Defense News show that Aviacon Zitotrans’s Soviet-era Ilyushin Il-76 aircraft flew missions linking the UAE to destinations in Africa, following the same routes and operational patterns as those used by other operators that have been tied to the UAE’s support for the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces in Sudan’s civil war. Several flights operated out of UAE military bases rather than civilian airports, implying a government connection.

Defense News reached out to the UAE embassies in Vienna and Washington, to the Abu Dhabi Media Office and the UAE’s foreign ministry for comment on the Aviacon Zitotrans links, but received no response. The airline itself also did not respond to a request for comment.

Other flights flown by Aviacon Zitotrans aircraft and identified by Defense News appear to have flown from the UAE to a private airstrip in eastern Pakistan known as Chandana Airstrip or Al Habieb Airport, which previous reporting has tied to the royal Al Nahyan ruling house of Abu Dhabi. The airstrip does not appear in online ICAO/IATA code databases or Pakistan’s Civil Aviation Authority lists. International reporting has identified it as a gateway to the Gulf royal family’s falconry hunting grounds in Pakistan.

Sparse videos and images exist on the internet of the airfield. Defense News reviewed footage showing large portraits of Gulf monarchs and Pakistani politicians next to the apron and framed in a plush airport waiting room, along with plenty of UAE flags flying alongside Pakistani ones. UAE personnel are flown in ahead of the royals’ use of the airstrip, according to a private plane tracker’s 2022 investigation.

Delivering weapons

When not operating on behalf of the UAE, Aviacon Zitotrans flies missions for the Russian government, including the shipment of weapons around the world. Leaked internal documents viewed by Defense News show that the airline has delivered combat helicopters to Southeast Asia, armored personnel vehicles to Turkey, and received a special exemption from the Russian government to fly missiles and their warheads.

The company lists “government and military airlifts” as one of its areas of operations on its website, touting that the Il-76 planes it uses are “capable of operating from short and unpaved runways” and “achieved an excellent reputation for its versatility and operational reliability.”

The cabin and rear ramp “provides smooth loading/unloading for many kinds of rolling stock, such as armored personnel carriers (APCs), utility trucks, trailers etc,” the company’s website explains.

“Aviacon Zitotrans specializes in using Il-76 aircraft, which are very helpful, very sturdy aircraft for transporting cargo and transporting people,” said Margaux Garcia, senior analyst with C4ADS, a U.S.-based nonprofit organization specializing in analyzing illicit networks. “They were originally built to be military transport aircraft, so it makes sense that they’re being used for that purpose.”

The company’s Russia-linked operations in Africa have previously attracted attention and prompted the U.S. government to sanction the airline. Sub-Saharan Africa was the main theatre of operations for the infamous Wagner Group, which has been rebranded as Africa Corps following the death of its leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin.

While most Western countries have cut trade with Russia and its state-affiliated entities to a minimum, and the European Union has banned all Russian aircraft from its airspace, the UAE government maintains friendly commercial and diplomatic relations. As a consequence, the country has turned into a hub for Russian sanctions circumvention and foreign procurement, a trend confirmed by the leaked Aviacon Zitotrans air waybills Defense News examined, which routinely showed the procurement of Western goods, including sanctioned electronics, through the Gulf monarchy.

Previous reporting by Reuters has also identified Dubai’s gold markets as a crucial lifeline for Russia, given its exclusion from global payment systems such as SWIFT.

At least three Aviacon Zitotrans-affiliated aircraft have flown routes that match known patterns of UAE government-sponsored missions since September 2025: RA-76842, RA-76502, RA-76846. Another aircraft, RA-76834, flew a mission connecting the UAE’s Sweihan Air Base to Bosaso, Somalia, a known Emirati logistics hub used for weapons shipments into Africa before Somali authorities canceled the relevant agreements with the UAE in January 2026.

“It perfectly makes sense within their business model that they would work for any kind of group that would be willing to fund them. It’s a similar type of work to the work that they seem to do for Russia. So it makes sense that they would expand into this other market,” said Garcia.

All three aircraft flying the vast majority of apparent UAE-chartered missions are explicitly listed by the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control as directly blocked property. Any other Aviacon Zitotrans airframes, including all that may have touched UAE territory on their Russian missions, are blocked by extension due to their connection to the company.

Most flights generally followed the same pattern: The aircraft would first depart a UAE airfield, usually the joint civil-military airport at Al Ain, Abu Dhabi airport, or, more rarely, a military base in the UAE. It would then fly south and west to the Gulf of Aden, where its transponder track would disappear. It would then reappear at the same location over the Gulf of Aden, flying back to the UAE later that day or a few days later.

Transponder conundrum

“If you notice that all of these planes that are run by the same airline all drop off of coverage, then that’s a notable pattern — especially if it happens that most other airplanes are able to travel through that area without dropping coverage,” said Garcia, whom Defense News showed its findings and data. “So it’s not a signal issue. It’s not a coverage issue. That suggests perhaps they are intentionally turning off their transponders; they’re hiding their activity.”

In total, Defense News identified well over 100 Aviacon Zitotrans sorties that had telltale characteristics of UAE government-linked cargo operations.

Defense News used a commercial aircraft tracking archive including ADS-B transponder and MLAT location data to follow the aircraft in question, building an extensive database of almost 9,000 flights conducted by a number of shadow airlines globally since early 2025. Each flight was manually reviewed. The data is often spotty due to deliberate obfuscation techniques or limited coverage, requiring pattern-matching and secondary sourcing through local reporting, ground photography and satellite imagery.

A handful of transponder tracks gave a more complete picture, filling in some of the blanks. A recurring destination was Ethiopia, particularly the Harar Meda Air Base, the Ethiopian military’s main air force facility, and Addis Ababa International Airport.

The Ethiopian embassies in Washington and Berlin did not return a request for comment.

The UAE and Russia are both deeply embroiled in the Sudanese civil war, but their governments support opposing sides. While Abu Dhabi supports the Rapid Support Forces, Russia has thrown its weight behind the government and its Sudanese Armed Forces. Aviacon Zitotrans’s apparent work for both the UAE and Russia has led to the situation that the same aircraft may be supplying opposing sides of the brutal civil war, sometimes flying from Russia and Turkey into Port Sudan, the SAF’s main supply point, and sometimes operating on UAE missions likely supporting the RSF through the African hinterland.

Aside from Africa, a handful of flights that took place during these aircraft’s apparent use by the UAE connected the Emirates to other Gulf countries, including Kuwait and Qatar.

Beyond the use of Aviacon Zitotrans aircraft, the UAE operates a fleet of cargo aircraft using front companies and ostensibly civilian charter cargo aircraft on similar missions, which Defense News will explore in a forthcoming investigation.

It’s unclear why UAE leaders picked Aviacon Zitotrans from the extensive market of cargo charter airlines. “It may be that they have seen Aviacon Zitotrans’s experience in this area, that they’ve worked in the same kind of high-sensitivity operations,” said Garcia.

The aircraft were also tracked flying other missions in equatorial and sub-Saharan Africa, including in Libya, Uganda, D.R. Congo and Nigeria, over the past year and a half. However, based on known patterns, many of these missions are likely to have been Russia-linked rather than on behalf of the UAE, even though the UAE was sometimes used as a stopover location or hub on the way.

Defense News has previously reported on an Aviacon Zitotrans Il-76 aircraft flying a secretive mission to Venezuela during mounting U.S. pressure on the country in October 2025. It was later revealed that the aircraft had delivered a Russian air defense system to Caracas. Intermediary refuelling stops are essential for these aircraft to cover such distances, as the range of the Ilyushin planes would otherwise be insufficient, the CEO of a different Russian shadow airline told Defense News as part of an earlier investigation.

“If this is the case that Aviacon is also running missions for the UAE alongside illicit missions for Russia, then it is significant because it shows that the UAE does not see the sanctions against Aviacon as a sufficient deterrent to stop working with them,” Garcia concluded.

Iraqi security experts say the withdrawal — agreed to in 2024 under U.S. President Joe Biden and carried out by Donald Trump’s administration even as it wages war against Iran — could give Tehran and its allies free rein, while also allowing other U.S. enemies, including the Islamic State, to stage a comeback.

“Iran stands to benefit strategically from the coalition’s departure because it removes a military presence that for years acted as a counterweight to Tehran’s influence in Iraq,” said Jasim al-Bahadli, an Iraqi security analyst specialising in studying armed Shi’ite groups aligned with Iran.

He predicted that the pro-Iranian militia groups would not only portray the departure as a victory for their movement, but also “seek to translate that momentum into greater influence over security and political decision making.”

Abu Mojtaba al-Yasiri, a commander in the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an ‌umbrella group of Iran-backed armed factions, described the U.S. withdrawal as “a historic victory for the Iraqi Islamic resistance groups and honorable Iraqis, and a crushing defeat for the American project.”

“On Sept. 30, we will celebrate the turning of a black page in Iraq’s history and the failure of the occupation to impose its will on our country,” he told Reuters. “Iraq has proven that its sovereignty cannot be secured by foreign forces, but by the resistance and the will of its people.”

NOT READY

While the eventual departure of U.S. forces is broadly popular among Iraqis, those who worry about the strength of the Iran-backed groups fear the withdrawal is premature.

“We believe Iraq is still not fully ready to take over the security file at this time,” Abdulrahman al-Zobaie, a Sunni tribal leader in Fallujah, once a bastion of anti-American resistance, told Reuters.

“All Iraqis aspire to full sovereignty, and no Iraqi would dispute that. But I believe that the [U.S.-led coalition] leaving in this way and creating a vacuum is what all Iraqis fear.”

American forces invaded Iraq in 2003 to topple Sunni Muslim dictator Saddam Hussein, and went on to occupy the country, install a Shi’ite-led government and fight a years-long counterinsurgency before withdrawing at the end of 2011.

They returned less than three years later to help Iraqi forces defeat the Sunni militant group the Islamic State in a major war from 2014 to 2017.

Around twice as many Americans died in “Operation Iraqi Freedom” as in the parallel war in Afghanistan, which ended with an abrupt U.S. withdrawal in 2021.

In recent years, Iraq has been the only country to maintain close political and military alliances with both the United States and Iran, which sometimes used Iraqi territory as a proxy battlefield.

The United States killed a top Iranian commander, Qasem Soleimani, with a strike on the Baghdad airport in 2020. Iran’s allies repeatedly fired on U.S. bases, sometimes drawing reprisals.

In this year’s war against Iran, seven of the U.S. service members listed as killed were in Iraq, the last an Army sergeant who died during the controlled detonation of a drone at a base near Erbil in July.

VICTORY FOR IRAN’S AXIS

Iran, which says its ultimate aim is to force American forces to leave the entire Middle East, casts the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq as a victory for its “axis of resistance” of allied armed groups across the region.

“Lasting security will prevail in Iraq” once the Americans leave the country and the region, the deputy chairman of the National Security Commission of Iran’s Parliament, Amir Hayat Moqaddam, said on Monday.

Iran “welcomes the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq and will undoubtedly support it,” he told Iran’s parliamentary news service. “Resistance groups are currently taking action, sometimes targeting and confronting American troops.”

Washington has accused Iran-backed militia groups in Iraq of playing a role in the wider Middle East conflict by launching attacks on neighboring countries at the direction of Tehran, most recently hitting a major Saudi oil pipeline this month. The Baghdad government says it is trying to curb their influence.

NEW LIFE FOR THE ISLAMIC STATE?

Some Iraqi security officials, both in the federal government and the semi-autonomous northern Kurdish region, say the U.S. pullout also risks giving new life to Islamic State fighters, who, despite the defeat of their self-proclaimed caliphate nearly a decade ago, retain a sleeper cell network.

At their height, the fighters occupied a third of Iraq and killed thousands of people, including hundreds they videotaped themselves gunning down inside a former U.S. military base.

A lack of U.S. intelligence, logistical support and drones will give the Islamic State a chance to regroup, said Kurdish commander Sirwan Barzani.

“For more than two weeks, we have noticed movement by [Islamic State] sleeper cells, after it was announced in the general media that there will be an official withdrawal of the international coalition from Iraq by the end of September,” he said. “This has boosted, in my opinion, the morale” of the fighters.

Iraqi security forces said a suspected Islamic State cell was preparing suicide attacks to coincide with the pullout. The plot highlighted concerns that the militant group remains capable of exploiting security gaps despite years of military setbacks, said four Iraqi security and army officials.

The Islamic State “is seeking to send a message that the group is still powerful and capable of launching bloody attacks,” said Col. Khalid al-Bayati, a senior security official in the strategic oil town of Kirkuk.

Macron also said a U.S. ban on diesel exports, which the White House has denied is under consideration, would be “catastrophic,” both globally and for the U.S. economy.

Macron was speaking in a wide-ranging primetime television interview on the international situation, in which he also warned about possible Russian attacks on French soil.

Facing growing pressure at home over high energy prices, Macron sought to assure the French that France had adequate gas and oil supplies as winter approaches. He said Paris was actively working to ensure flows were not disrupted.

Crude oil prices have surged recently as the main alternative route for Saudi oil exports through Yanbu has come under missile attacks from Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis.

“We are going to send military resources, that is to say, soldiers, radar systems and defense systems, to protect this site — not to get us involved in any conflicts, but to protect this site,” Macron told TF1 and France 2 TV.

Russian threat

Macron dismissed a report by Spanish newspaper El Mundo that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency had warned European governments about the threat of potential drone attacks from the Mediterranean.

“I can deny it. The CIA did not inform French services,” he said.

Still, Macron said Russia is multiplying hostile and criminal acts against European countries, and France could face strikes similar to the failed attack in Leipzig. Germany said Russia was responsible for an attempted drone attack in August on the Leipzig airport.

Macron gathered French party chiefs at the Elysee last week to brief them on the growing threat from Russia. He later said he had ordered his government to draw up a plan to protect critical infrastructure against drone and cyber attacks.

Macron said Moscow was seeking to intimidate Europe and break the continent’s resolve in supporting Ukraine.

Russia says European allegations of hybrid attacks are baseless and the result of anti-Russian hysteria.

Yet Macron’s position on Russia was weakened this week after France shocked other EU members by getting Russian-Uzbek metals tycoon Alisher Usmanov exempted from EU sanctions, citing national security concerns. That prompted Azerbaijan to pardon a French national jailed for espionage.