The United Arab Emirates Navy (UAEN) is the naval branch of the

United Arab Emirates Armed Forces The United Arab Emirates Armed Forces () are the armed forces of the United Arab Emirates. They consist of the United Arab Emirates Army, UAE Army, United Arab Emirates Navy, UAE Navy, United Arab Emirates Air Force, UAE Air Force, United Arab E ...

. It is small force of about 3,000 personnel. It maintains 12 well-equipped coastal

patrol boat A patrol boat (also referred to as a patrol craft, patrol ship, or patrol vessel) is a relatively small naval ship, naval vessel generally designed for Coastal defence and fortification, coastal defence, Border control, border security, or law ...

s and eight

missile boat A missile boat or missile cutter is a small, fast warship armed with anti-ship missiles. Being smaller than other warships such as destroyers and frigates, missile boats are popular with nations interested in forming a navy at lower cost. They ...

s. Although primarily concerned with coastal defense, the Navy is constructing a six-unit class of

blue water Maritime geography is a collection of terms used by naval military units to loosely define three maritime regions: brown water, green water, and blue water. Definitions The elements of maritime geography are loosely defined and their meanings hav ...

corvette A corvette is a small warship. It is traditionally the smallest class of vessel considered to be a proper (or " rated") warship. The warship class above the corvette is that of the frigate, while the class below was historically that of the sloo ...

s in conjunction with French shipbuilder CMN. The UAE maintains a battalion-sized marine force called the UAE Marines equipped with

BMP-3 The BMP-3 is a Soviet and Russian infantry fighting vehicle, successor to the BMP-1 and BMP-2. The abbreviation BMP stands for ''Boevaya Mashina Pekhoty'' (, literally "infantry combat vehicle"). Production history The design of the BMP-3 ('' ...

armoured personnel carriers from Soviet union/Russia. Swedish shipbuilder Swede Ship Marine have built four 24 m Amphibious Troop Transport Vessel and one 25 m Fast Supply Vessel for the UAE Navy (delivered between 2003 and 2005). Three additional vessels are being built by Swede Ship Marine for the UAE Navy (see Future Navy).

History

The origins of the UAE Navy begin with the Abu Dhabi Defence Force (ADDF) which established a Sea Wing in 1967. The initial fleet gave Abu Dhabi a limited brown-water patrolling and protecting capability in the waters of the

Persian Gulf The Persian Gulf, sometimes called the Arabian Gulf, is a Mediterranean seas, mediterranean sea in West Asia. The body of water is an extension of the Arabian Sea and the larger Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.Un ...

and in the littoral region of the Northern Emirates in the Gulf of Oman. This included protection of the UAE's significant offshore oil and gas facilities. With the formation of the United Arab Emirates on 2 December 1971 and the unification of the UAE Armed Forces on 6 May 1976, the ADDF Sea Wing became the UAE Navy and continued to expand with naval facilities at Abu Dhabi port in 1975 as well as other facilities at the far west of Abu Dhabi Emirate and on the eastern coast of Fujairah at

Khor Fakkan Khor Fakkan () is a city and an exclave of the Emirate of Sharjah, located on the east coast of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), facing the Gulf of Oman, and geographically surrounded by the Emirate of Fujairah. The city, the second largest on ...

. The Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988) and especially the 1986 ' tanker war' in the

culminated in the 25 November 1986 attack of Abu Dhabi's Abu Al Bukhoosh offshore oil platforms by Iranian aircraft. These incidents led to further expansion of the UAE's Navy assets in this period. The 1990s and 2000s saw further consolidation. In 2001, the UAE Coast Guard, which had been under the control of the UAE Ministry of Interior since 1976, was transferred to the control of the Navy. This change was likely in response to increased concern over the possibility of terrorist attacks on critical infrastructure in the UAE's littoral zone and on its islands in the post-

9/11 The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

world, and the effectiveness of the Coast Guard in countering this threat. Another change in the Navy's force structure in the 2000s was the expansion of its amphibious capability and the formation of the

UAE Navy Marines The United Arab Emirates (UAE), or simply the Emirates, is a country in West Asia, in the Middle East, at the eastern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is a federal elective monarchy made up of seven emirates, with Abu Dhabi serving as its ...

(subsequently merged with the

UAE Presidential Guard The UAE Presidential Guard (UAE-PG) () is an elite military special operations unit of the United Arab Emirates Armed Forces. It is a military unit that operates outside the conventional framework of traditional armed forces. Its estimated 12,000 ...

). Since 2015, the UAE Navy has been operating in the Yemen region in response to the

Civil War A civil war is a war between organized groups within the same Sovereign state, state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies.J ...

there.

Equipment

Vessels

Leased

HSV-2 Swift HSV-2 ''Swift'' is a hybrid catamaran. She was privately owned and operated by Sealift Inc., and was originally built under the JHSV program as a proof of concept. As part of this program, she was directly leased for evaluation from her builde ...

- Sub-

leased A lease is a contractual arrangement calling for the user (referred to as the ''lessee'') to pay the owner (referred to as the Lessor (leasing), ''lessor'') for the use of an asset. Property, buildings and vehicles are common assets that are l ...

or transferred from the UAE's ''National Marine Dredging Company'' sometime early in 2015. Used for

logistics Logistics is the part of supply chain management that deals with the efficient forward and reverse flow of goods, services, and related information from the point of origin to the Consumption (economics), point of consumption according to the ...

and related activities as part of the ongoing

Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen On 26 March 2015, Saudi Arabia, leading a coalition of nine countries from West Asia and North Africa, launched a military intervention in Yemen at the request of Yemeni president Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi, who had been ousted from the capital, Sa ...

, including reportedly in

support Support may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Supporting character * Support (art), a solid surface upon which a painting is executed Business and finance * Support (technical analysis) * Child support * Customer support * Income Su ...

amphibious operations Amphibious warfare is a type of Offensive (military), offensive military operation that today uses naval ships to project ground and air power onto a hostile or potentially hostile shore at a designated landing beach. Through history the opera ...

. This ship was directly hit by a Houthi missile attack and severely damaged during operations in October 2016.

Naval Bases

The UAE Navy has several naval bases: * Ghantoot Naval base * Jabel Ali Naval Base

Future Navy

Until 2014, 12 Ghannatha Phase II class fast missile landing crafts will be commissioned. The first unit was launched in July 2012. Another 12 were upgraded from Ghannatha Phase I class 4 Falaj 2 class patrol vessel (based on the Italian Diciotti class) are on order, 2 being outfitted with 550 tons - 4 MM-40 Exocets - 6 Mica VL SAM (with an additional 4 to be produced in the future, grand total 8) One 26 m Offshore Patrol Vessel, one 24 m Amphibious Troop Transport Vessel and one 24 m Patrol Vessel are under construction for the UAE Navy. On 1 July 2022, the United Arab Emirates Navy signed a Memorandum of Understanding with PT PAL Indonesia to purchase a 163-meter version of the Makassar-class Landing Platform Dock, with construction scheduled to begin in 2024. The First Steel Cutting ceremony for the Landing Platform Dock 163M, also known as the Al Maryah Project, took place on 28 February 2024..

References

{{United Arab Emirates topics Military of the United Arab Emirates