In May 2025, the first foreign trip of President Donald Trump’s second term took him to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. Widely credited with bolstering regional support for the military operation against Iran known as Midnight Hammer, less well recognized is how that trip put the United States at the center of a reset of global energy markets.
Three momentous events in the past two months indicate that these efforts are paying off: Saudi Arabia’s 20-year natural gas contract with Louisiana producer Caturus Energy, Qatar’s participation in the opening of the Golden Pass natural gas export facility in Texas, and the UAE’s announcement that the country is leaving the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).
On February 24, just days before the conflict with Iran began, Saudi Arabia announced a 20-year contract to import natural gas from the Commonwealth liquefied natural gas (LNG) division of US producer Caturus. The US and Saudi Arabia, two of the world’s largest energy producers, will no longer have a simple – if sometimes fraught – relationship between importer and exporter, as has been the case for the past eighty years. Instead, they are embarking on an era of energy coordination that could be of great mutual benefit.
The Saudi national identity, not to mention its wealth, has emerged from their role as a massive energy exporter with the crucial ability to increase production when necessary at the turn of a dial.
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Qatar Energy facilities in Ras Laffan Industrial City on March 3, 2026, after the company halted LNG production at the Ras Laffan and Mesaieed sites following reported Iranian attacks. (Stringer/Getty)
Historically, the kingdom has fiercely resisted energy imports. For this reason the raw burning electricity power stations, especially on the Red Sea, have been retained, even though converting them to natural gas would not only make them more efficient but also free up more Saudi oil for export.
Why this change in attitude? Largely because the Saudis can see that their energy needs will grow exponentially if they realize their ambitions to become an artificial intelligence hub, and they want to be a technology partner of the United States in the process.
Now the world’s two largest energy producers are embarking on a new partnership that could provide abundant, reliable and reasonably priced energy flows to partners from Europe to Latin America to Southeast Asia, and even to each other, if desired.
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Then, on March 30, after a construction process that survived a bankruptcy of the main contractor, Golden Pass LNG in Sabine Pass Texel produced its first cargo – leaves for Europe on April 22. Golden Pass is one joint venture in which QatarEnergy has a 70% stake and ExxonMobil 30%, with Qatar’s trading arm accounting for the lion’s share of production. It represents Qatar’s largest foreign energy investment to date and is a clear signal that Qatar sees the United States as a natural gas partner, not a rival.
The irony couldn’t be sharper: just weeks before the Golden Pass opened, Iranian missile strikes destroyed Qatar’s LNG facility at Ras Laffan, knocking out capacity valued by analysts at around $20 billion in annual revenue – with repairs expected to take up to five years.
Golden Pass Train 1 came online three weeks later, and Qatar now has American-produced gas flowing to its customers at just the time when its home facilities are dark. A decade of investment in a Texas terminal, pursued over the objections of skeptics who questioned why the world’s largest gas exporter needed a U.S. facility, has been vindicated in one month.
Finally, after bearing the brunt of Iran’s reckless attacks on its Gulf neighbors, the UAE announced it would leave OPEC as of May 1. The departure of a long-time member and one of the cartel’s three largest producers is nothing short of seismic for the organization and will significantly weaken its power.
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But under OPEC rules, the UAE is limited to around 3 million barrels per day, despite having the capacity to approach 5 million – a quota designed to artificially regulate prices, suppress UAE production and make new infrastructure investments difficult to justify.
Why this change in attitude? Largely because the Saudis can see that their energy needs will grow exponentially if they realize their ambitions to become an artificial intelligence hub, and they want to be a technology partner of the United States in the process.
This decision brings the UAE ever closer to the United States and Trump, who has repeatedly protested against OPEC. accusing it of ‘ripping off the rest of the world’ by controlling prices and supply. Freed from OPEC’s scrutiny, the UAE will be free to engage in the kind of energy coordination with the US that we see with Saudi Arabia and Qatar on a level playing field, all of which will result in more products on the market to soften the impact of the energy shock in Iran. Other disgruntled OPEC members should take note of the UAE’s strategic vision.
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All of this makes for an extraordinary trifecta of geopolitical energy gains for America over the course of about two months. While clearing the Strait of Hormuz remains a necessary challenge for President Trump, and the world needs that energy to flow freely again, he can approach this action from a position of strength rather than desperation.
Operation Epic Fury put the United States’ powerful energy power on full display, and we have the potential to emerge from the conflict in a much stronger position, in coordination with Gulf partners and allies, to continue meeting the global energy needs that Iran has attempted to hold hostage.
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