Connexion
The Mecca Pact creates new opportunities for Islamabad—and new headaches.
Pakistan has long practiced a careful balancing act to manage relations with Iran and the Gulf Arab monarchies. But against the backdrop of the ongoing U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, and the emergence of Yemen and the Red Sea as the “Western Front” of this regional crisis, the balancing act is getting harder to sustain.
Pakistan has strong strategic and economic ties with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) members, and has long seen stability in the Gulf as important to its interests. So Islamabad naturally has no appetite for Iranian or Houthi attacks on targets in GCC states, and officials in Islamabad have been quick to condemn such aggression. At the same time, Pakistan has much at stake in its relationship with Iran, with which it also seeks stable and cordial ties.
Geography dictates that Pakistan accept fundamental differences between its relationship with Iran and those with Gulf Arab states. The Pakistan–Iran border is long and difficult, and cross-border militant activity, particularly in Balochistan, is a persistent concern for both countries. Iran’s engagement with Afghanistan also affects Pakistani security interests in its near abroad. Nor is the relationship limited strictly to security. Pakistan has sought to expand bilateral trade and remains interested in energy cooperation, including the long-discussed Iran–Pakistan gas pipeline. Iran’s position on the Gulf of Oman also touches Pakistan’s maritime and economic interests, to say nothing of Tehran’s relationship with New Delhi.
Therefore, Pakistan’s regional balancing act requires recognizing that while Saudi Arabia is a crucial strategic, defense, and economic partner, Iran is Pakistan’s immediate neighbor. A serious deterioration in relations with Tehran could generate direct consequences for Pakistan’s border security, regional stability, and economic interests, underscoring why Islamabad has such strong incentives to preserve a functional relationship with Iran, independent of its desire to maintain its partnerships with Saudi Arabia and other GCC members.
Domestic politics matter too. Pakistan has a sizable Shia minority, which includes elements sympathetic to Iran, so there is a chance taking a harder line toward Tehran could trigger protests at home.
Pakistan wants to see the current U.S.-Iran crisis resolved as quickly as possible, which is why its government has invested considerable diplomatic energy in trying to de-escalate the conflict, seeking to position itself as a bridge between the two sides. Preserving that intermediary role requires Pakistan to avoid becoming an active belligerent.
Unveiled last month, the new Mecca Joint Defense Agreement—a security configuration consisting of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey—and Pakistan’s recently ratified defense pact with Kuwait stand to significantly complicate this delicate balancing act.
The latest Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia are an early test of what these new security commitments actually mean. The Mecca pact does not appear to create an automatic obligation to fight if a member is attacked; rather it provides a framework for consultation and collective action. The affected country requests assistance under the agreement, and the members themselves determine what form that assistance should take. Nevertheless, such an arrangement can strengthen deterrence without guaranteeing immediate military response.
The alliance itself is still a work in progress. The military and policymaking integration necessary to implement such an agreement takes time. And, notably, Saudi Arabia has not actually requested direct Pakistani or Turkish military intervention. For now, Islamabad is more likely to contribute through diplomacy, intelligence, air-defense capabilities, and technological assistance, and perhaps supporting a multinational naval presence around the Bab al-Mandeb. (It’s worth noting that this past May, Pakistan reportedly deployed a detachment including 8,000 troops and 16 military aircraft to Saudi Arabia.)
There are good reasons for this restraint. Pakistan has previously resisted becoming a combatant in Yemen, highlighted by a parliamentary vote on April 10, 2015, to reject a proposal to join the Saudi-led military coalition fighting the Houthis. At that time, Pakistani parliamentarians vowed “unequivocal support for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia” while also declaring that Islamabad “should maintain neutrality in the Yemen conflict so as to be able to play a proactive diplomatic role to end the crisis.”
Today, sending troops into the conflict would still carry serious domestic, economic, security, and diplomatic costs for Pakistan. More importantly, joining the war on the Saudi side could undermine Islamabad’s channels with Tehran and its effort to facilitate U.S.–Iran de-escalation.
Here is a dilemma. An alliance’s credibility ultimately rests on its members’ willingness to commit to collective defense in the face of real costs. If Pakistan consistently avoids direct military involvement, members and non-members alike may come to wonder how far the pact’s security guarantees actually extend.
Nevertheless, restraint should not automatically be interpreted as failure, especially at this early stage. Pakistan can contribute meaningfully, whether by diplomacy or through the provision of ancillary military support, in ways that don’t require the involvement of combat forces. The challenge for Pakistan is to use those contributions to demonstrate that its defense commitments are credible, without widening a regional war or endangering its role as a mediator.
The post Pakistan’s Defense Dilemma appeared first on The American Conservative.
Pakistan’s army chief Asim Munir will visit Iran Monday to continue peace talks, the Iranian foreign ministry said Sunday. In June, Pakistan helped broker a framework U.S.–Iran agreement—the memorandum of understanding (MOU)—that quickly fell apart but still offers a possible off-ramp from the war.
A Pakistani government source told Reuters that Munir planned to discuss recent threats of economic warfare by President Donald Trump, among other issues. “He will discuss peace under Islamabad’s MOU, Trump’s warning, and the situation after the Pakistan-Turkey-Saudi Arab Agreement and Houthi issues with Iranian leaders,” the source said.
Al Arabiya, a Saudi television channel, reported that Munir will convey messages from the U.S. to Iranian leaders.
Hardliners in Tehran have criticized the MOU, but Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian says it remains the best path to peace and economic security. “There is not a single provision in this agreement that amounts to capitulation,” Pezeshkian said in a speech published Sunday by Iranian state media. Pezeshkian has acknowledged Iran’s ongoing economic problems, including inflation and unemployment.
Iran has been invited to join the Saudi-Turkish–Pakistani defense pact signed earlier this month, Lebanese media reported Saturday, citing an Iranian official. That reporting has not been confirmed. Riyadh and Tehran historically have had tense relations, but Iran’s Foreign Ministry praised the pact as marking a welcome shift in the regional security order.
The post Iran War Day 177: Pakistani Army Chief Heading to Tehran for Talks appeared first on The American Conservative.
Washington should give the Mecca Joint Defense Agreement a chance.
Heartwarming scenes out of Mecca Friday: After the conclusion of a defense pact between Turkey, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia, those countries’ respective leaders powwowed in a high-rise conference room to get themselves photographed praying towards the Kaaba. The beef over the Saudi dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi in Turkish territory is just a dim memory. The Mecca Joint Defense Agreement avers that an attack on one member state will be interpreted as an attack on all, a combination that should notionally have some teeth on the strength of Turkish conventional arms, the Pakistani nuclear deterrent, and Saudi money.
Well, paper is paper, and the actual text of the agreement has not yet been published. We’ll see. It should be noted that Riyadh and Islamabad already had a pact along these lines, which did not seem to do much when the Iranians and the Houthis started lobbing ordnance at ARAMCO installations this summer. Granted, the Pakistanis were notionally trying to mediate an end to war at the time, but this point emphasizes the fuzziness of current Pakistani strategy—does Pakistan want to secure its ends by becoming a trusted neutral party, a la Oman or Norway, or by becoming an actual agonist in the international system? (The Pakistanis just seem to be delighted that they’re in so much diplomatic demand these days.) It is not entirely clear what Pakistan gets out of this deal; access to Turkish weapons—less controversial than Chinese suppliers, less expensive than American—and Saudi financing would be the most obvious carrots, but this must remain a guess for now.
The Turkish angle is somewhat clearer: Ankara presumably wants to sell a lot of weapons and is happy to create a market. The Pakistani nuclear deterrent could at least theoretically offset the threat of nuclear blackmail from Israel, where politicians are making increasingly aggressive noises against Turkey, or from Iran, if this whole war thing ends up encouraging the ayatollahs to dash for the bomb. The pact may also encourage the development of deeper economic ties with Saudi, a topic of discussion since the stabilization of Syria has opened a previously difficult trade corridor along what used to be the Ottoman Hejaz railway.
As for the Saudis, Turkey’s military industry and large army and Pakistan’s nuclear deterrent are the obvious attractions. It is perhaps not accidental that defense relations with Pakistan were restated shortly after President Donald Trump functionally nixed the near-term prospects for a Saudi nuclear program.
None of these countries shares a border with the others—indeed, Turkey and Pakistan are both peripheral to the region, albeit large—and Saudi is the only Arab country. This preserves Saudi ambitions to regional preeminence, if not hegemony; it is unlikely that Pakistan or Turkey, if only for purely geographic reasons, is voluntarily going to try to exert much force over the rest of the region. While none of the countries has particularly warm relations with Israel and all have expressed disquiet with current Israeli policies, both in Gaza and in the region at large, they have also historically embraced pragmatism above ideology in their relations with Jerusalem. Similarly, none of them is especially enthusiastic about the Islamic Republic of Iran, but prefers getting along most days to most of the alternatives. And all three countries have pretty cozy relations with the United States.
On the whole, this looks like a foundation for a post-retrenchment Middle Eastern order that the U.S. could live with—particularly since Turkey, as a NATO member, will always share certain alignments of interest with the U.S. It’s notable that the Americans were not involved in its creation—if we were, doubtless the thing would have run aground on our insistence on complete normalization with Our Number One Ally in the region—and also that it seems directed as much against Iranian power and aggression as Israeli. With the writing on the wall for American regional involvement, this sort of thing is more or less what you’d expect to happen: the emergence of an equilibrium internal to the system. Perhaps, after all these years, what we needed to do was just leave!
But this is granting that the Mecca pact is something more than words. Saudi is at this point already involved in the Iran War; another round of escalation between the U.S. and Iran could destruction-test the agreement before it has time to be implemented in any kind of concrete way. (God knows how many schemes to bring the Middle East together as a functional, normal bloc have run aground.) That’s another reason to wrap up the war, along with the expense, the weakening of American force posture in more important theaters, and the overall strategic failure without prospect of improvement: At some point, getting out of the Middle East will necessitate, well, getting out of the Middle East, and letting it largely go its own way. Why not give the Mecca Joint Defense Agreement a chance?
The post A Glimpse of the Post-American Middle East? appeared first on The American Conservative.
The governments of Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Pakistan agreed to a mutual defense pact on Friday, with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif traveling to Mecca for the signing ceremony.
Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry said that the pact, known as the Mecca Joint Defense Agreement, is “intended to strengthen collective deterrence against any act of aggression, and stipulates that any armed attack against any one of the three states shall be regarded as an attack against them all” (in this last respect, it seems to closely resemble NATO’s Article Five).
The agreement has been interpreted by many as a response to the deteriorating security situation in the Middle East. According to the New York Times, factors that led the three countries to band together include “the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran; new attacks on Saudi Arabia that it has blamed on Iran’s allies in Yemen and Iraq; concerns about Israel’s expanding military actions; and doubts about the reliability of the United States.”
The agreement is similar to a bilateral defense pact between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan signed in September 2025, according to reporting by the Financial Times. The FT also quoted one anonymous source who framed the deal as “a prelude to more Saudi military action against the Houthis,” suggesting that Turkey and Pakistan could get more involved in that conflict, which has escalated considerably in recent weeks.
Saudi Arabia also perceives threats from Iran-aligned militias in Iraq. On Thursday evening Reuters reported that Saudi Arabia had detected drone and missile movements that could indicate impending attacks. Saudi and U.S. forces last bombed Iraq on July 29, targeting what they claimed were Iraqi militia groups responsible for strikes on Saudi oil sites. It remains unclear whether future attacks emanating from Iraq would trigger the defense pact.
Ebrahim Rezaei, a member of Iran’s parliamentary committee on national security, responded to the deal with a post on X Friday, writing that “Saudis must know that a paper agreement with Turkey and Pakistan will not bring them security.”
The post Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan Sign Joint Defense Pact appeared first on The American Conservative.
The Islamic Republic may be in a stronger position than ever before.
Nobody is making it easy for Vice President J.D. Vance and his team of negotiators.
Israel’s continued military campaign in Lebanon has caused Iran to doubt America’s commitment, or ability, to carry out the very first point of the memorandum of understanding (MOU), which calls for an end to the war in Lebanon and ensures that nation’s “territorial integrity and sovereignty,” and has led to the possible reclosure of the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump’s threat, as the negotiators sat down to talk, to the Iranians that if they close the Strait, “you won’t have a country. You won’t even make it back to your f—ing country” violated the clause in point one committing both sides to “refrain from the threat or use of force against each other” and nearly caused Iranian negotiators to walk out just as they were getting started.
The only gain the U.S. negotiators have secured so far is that Iran, in Trump’s words, “fully and completely agreed to the highest level Nuclear inspections.” But have they? Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman, Esmail Baghaei, says Iran has “no plans to invite inspectors from the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency to nuclear sites that were hit by U.S. and Israeli airstrikes in June 2025.”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio says that’s not true: “We know what they agreed to. I don’t know why they have to say the things they say.”
Iran aims to table nuclear negotiations until near the end of the current talks, but it likely will have to agree to inspections as part of the complete agreement. But that is not a U.S. negotiating win that can be sold to justify the war.
As a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, Iran has historically allowed inspections of its nuclear sites. As part of the 2015 JCPOA nuclear agreement, Iran implemented an Additional Protocol agreement and voluntarily subjected itself to perhaps the toughest inspection regime in history. They suspended the Additional Protocol only in 2021, almost three years after Trump pulled out of the JCPOA and subjected Iran to maximum pressure sanctions. It was only after the bombing of Iran’s civilian nuclear facilities in June last year that Iran suspended cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency. The U.S. isn’t likely to secure an inspection regime better than what the JCPOA brought. But, for Iran, some things may well be better.
Agreement has been reached to begin releasing frozen Iranian funds. After the first day of negotiations, the release of $12 billion of frozen funds was agreed to. That promises massive economic relief for the Iranian people.
Trump says, “Money that’s being unfrozen is going to be used to buy food, and the food is going to be bought exclusively through the United States.” But remarks by Iranian officials suggest that may not be true. Iran’s central bank governor, Abdolnaser Hemmati, says that, although Iran can purchase American agricultural products “if the price and quality of American inputs are more suitable compared to other countries,” Iran is under “no obligation” to do so under the MOU. Indeed, the document states that the unfrozen funds “shall be made fully usable for payment to any ultimate beneficiary designated by the Central Bank of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
And Iran has, at least temporarily, won another massive source of economic relief from maximum pressure sanctions. This week, the U.S. Treasury Department waived sanctions on Iranian oil exports during the 60-day negotiations kicked off by the MOU, meaning that Iran can export oil at market rates.
One concession that the U.S. is likely to gain is Iran’s agreement to dilute its 60 percent enriched uranium and to suspend its nuclear enrichment program for a specified time.
Diluting its highly enriched uranium, though, is not a huge win or improvement over the JCPOA era. As part of that agreement, Iran shipped about 97 percent of its enriched uranium to Russia and limited future enrichment to 3.67 percent: enough for a civilian nuclear power program but not nearly high enough for a weapons program. After Trump pulled out of the JCPOA and subjected Iran to maximum pressure sanctions, Iran began enriching to 60 percent—still well short of the 90 percent required for a weapon—precisely as leverage to get a deal like this one.
As for suspending enrichment, depending on the length of the required period, Iran may well be willing to do that too. It probably needs several years to rebuild the war-damaged infrastructure anyway. The extra years are the trade Iran may be willing to make to win two larger prizes. Barbara Slavin, distinguished fellow at the Stimson Center, told The American Conservative that Tehran is willing to temporarily suspend enrichment to win permanent access to their frozen funds, which, ultimately, could bring Iran as much as $124 billion to $167 billion of relief.
But, more importantly, a lesson Iran has learned from this war, Slavin says, is that the ability to close the Strait of Hormuz gives them way more leverage than adding another centrifuge or increasing its stockpile of enriched uranium ever did.
Along with enrichment, the fate of that crucial sea passage is the tough terrain over which the negotiations will be fought.
Rubio says that the Strait is “an international waterway” and that “no country is allowed to charge tolls or fees on an international waterway,” but that’s not quite what the MOU says. It says only that Iran must allow safe passage “with no charge, for 60 days only.” That suggests that Iran could see the realization of its demand to charge a fee for transiting as part of a final agreement.
The Strait had always been free and open prior to the war. But the MOU suggests that it could stay under some kind of Iranian management after the war, stipulating that Iran “will conduct dialogue” with Oman to “define the future administration” of the Strait.
Returning from the first day of talks, Iran’s chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said, “The Strait of Hormuz will never return to its pre-war conditions and will be administered by the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
On Tuesday, the dialogue conducted between Oman and Iran produced “a joint working group” on the management of the Strait. Contrary to Rubio’s declarations, the two countries emphasized “their sovereignty and sovereign rights over their territorial waters in the strait.” While they committed to keeping the Strait open and safe, they, notably, discussed “the future administration of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, the services to be provided there and the associated costs,” suggesting that, though they would charge no tolls, they could charge service and environmental fees.
Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian has also made it plain that Iran’s ballistic missile program will “never” be part of the final agreement: “We will never negotiate with anyone, under any circumstances, ever, about our defensive capabilities.” For Tehran, there is no point in a negotiated settlement that leaves Iran in a position to lose the next round of the war: “If the missiles we have for our defense did not exist, Israel and the United States would have ploughed Iran just like Gaza.”
The Trump administration is right to defend the MOU as necessary and good. But it is good because it ends the war instead of allowing it to continue on its increasingly damaging path. They are wrong to defend it as an improvement over the JCPOA or even the deal that was on the table before the U.S. and Israel attacked this February. The Islamic Republic, liberated from maximum pressure sanctions and having demonstrated its ability to close the Strait of Hormuz and withstand major attacks, will be in a stronger position than perhaps ever before. A final agreement should be signed; the war should never have been fought.
The post Blame the War, Not the Peace Deal, for Iran’s Leverage appeared first on The American Conservative.
U.S. belligerence is driving Russia and the Global South closer to China.
There are no winners in the war on Iran. But if there were one, it would surely be China.
Contrary to NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte’s fawning remarks, “the whole world” is neither “safer” nor better for President Donald Trump’s decision to launch an illegal war on Iran. As the U.S. knows, Iran was not in pursuit of a nuclear bomb. Nor were its ballistic missiles intended for, or ever used for, offensive first strikes.
The foundation of international trust has cracked, and partnerships have been broken. The world can no longer trust the United States. The bond between Europe and the U.S. has been frayed. And the hard-won emerging trust between Iran and its Gulf neighbors, which had held the hope of a safer region, has been badly wounded.
There are only losers in this war: the Gulf states, Ukraine, America, and, of course, the Iranian people. An important long-term geopolitical loss suffered by the U.S. is the accelerated erosion of its hegemony and the continued transfer of trust to China.
Recently, Beijing has emerged as a more powerful broker of peace than had been understood. Because of its close relationship with Iran, China was able to help bring it to the table for peace talks in Islamabad; because of its special relationship with Pakistan, it was able to help set the table.
Prior to the first round of Islamabad talks, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister, Ishaq Dar, went to Beijing. According to the Chinese foreign ministry, the purpose of his trip was to “strengthen” Chinese–Pakistani cooperation in making “new efforts toward advocating for peace” in the region.
The Chinese foreign ministry has said China “worked actively to help bring about an end to the conflict,” and the White House confirms that “there were conversations that took place between top levels of our government and China’s government.”
I am told by Michael Swaine, Senior Research Fellow in the East Asia Program of the Quincy Institute, that there are “numerous reports that the Chinese have had frequent talks with Iran and other regional players and had urged Iran to enter a ceasefire. How much influence China has over Iran, though, is unclear.” Swaine says that China wants to be seen “as supportive of peace and lawful behavior” while, at the same time, “not getting directly dragged into the imbroglio.”
Though China is not a direct participant in negotiations, it has significant influence over the process of diplomacy. Whether and to what extent China is indirectly involved in the war itself remains unclear.
U.S. intelligence claims to have obtained information that China may have sent shoulder-fired missiles to Iran and may have been considering sending advanced radar systems. The intelligence is not definitive, and China says they have “never provided weapons to any party in the conflict” and has called the reports “fabricated.” In a strangely qualified statement, Trump said he asked Chinese President Xi Jinping not to send weapons to Iran, and Xi assured him that they are “essentially… not doing that.”
Always studious about not getting involved in foreign wars, China has not fully exercised its available military leverage and has likely not sent weapons. But it has supported Iran diplomatically. The foreign ministry called the U.S. closure of the Strait of Hormuz “a dangerous and irresponsible move.” And when the United Nations Security Council took up a resolution on coordinating an effort to reopen the Strait, China (and Russia) vetoed it.
When the U.S. went ahead with a total blockade of Iranian ports, China stood firm in support of Iran. “Iran controls the Strait of Hormuz,” Chinese Defense Minister Dong Jun said. “We have trade and energy agreements with Iran. We will respect and honor them and expect others not to meddle in our affairs.”
The American insistence that civilian enrichment is not a sovereign right of Iran but a conditional right to be granted by the U.S. undermines the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and constitutes a usurpation of the authority of the International Atomic Energy Agency. By waging a war of aggression against Iran, the U.S. has usurped the powers of the UN Security Council. These are not the actions of a benevolent hegemon upholding the international order but of a predatory hegemon.
These developments have made an already trepidatious Global South even more apprehensive of American power—and have made China’s restraint and diplomacy look even more dependable.
The Global South is consistently wary of what appears to be American primacy and neocolonialism. They are increasingly worried about the replacement of international law by American might. The U.S. war on Iran, which has created an oil supply shock, is a source of extreme anxiety for the Global South, the region most affected by the rising cost of oil.
China has been a voice of support for the Global South and its preferred vision of multipolarity and international law. “Maintaining the authority of international rule of law means not only using it when it suits us and abandoning it when it doesn’t,” Xi has said. “We cannot allow the world to revert to the law of the jungle.”
U.S. belligerence has pushed Beijing and Moscow even closer together, and Xi has called on Russia to join China in promoting a more “just and equitable international order” in the face of a “changing and turbulent” international situation.” The current unbalanced international order has made the China–Russia partnership even more “precious,” Xi said. He added that China and Russia need an even stronger partnership to safeguard the interests of the Global South. The partners need to “firmly uphold and practice multilateralism, work together to revitalize the authority and vitality of the United Nations [and] promote the development of the international order in a more just and reasonable direction.”
The U.S. erosion and selective application of international law is driving the Global South and Russia away from America and toward China, which presents itself as a reliable partner and defender of international law. “The United States,” Swaine says, “is helping China make that case through its reckless, unstrategic, and illegal actions.” This will be one of the great long-term costs of Trump’s war on Iran.
The post How the Iran War Makes China Look Good appeared first on The American Conservative.
The only Islamic nuclear power is in an unusually commanding position following the outbreak of the Iran War.
Pakistan has never been a country credited with strong civilian institutions or good long term thinking. The country is nominally led by the unpopular Shehbaz Sharif, who answers to the Chief of Defense Forces Asim Munir, who holds the real power. Sharif was empowered after his predecessor, Imran Khan, ran afoul of the general. Khan wound up in prison and Sharif wound up in charge. This wasn’t out of the ordinary for Pakistan. In the almost 80 years that the country has existed, more than 20 people have served as prime minister. Not one has completed a full term.
Despite this remarkable history, the country remains secure. While it is in some sense a basket-case, taking IMF after loan after IMF loan, the ability of various powers to use it as a conduit has served it well since independence. From alliance with America during the Cold War and Global War on Terror to sustained friendship with China, the country has had no shortage of foreign benefactors. These are ultimately alliances of convenience, serving partner countries’ interests—as illustrated in episodes like the U.S. funding the Afghan mujahideen via Pakistan—and sometimes overlapping with Pakistan in trying to destabilize India.
Beyond the periodic butterfly eyes from foreign powers, the Pakistani state has one tool at its disposal that has ensured its long-term survival even if not long-term success: its nuclear program. The country’s bombs were developed in the ’80s and ’90s, shortly after India developed their own. Pakistan has shared the knowledge beyond their borders already; the North Korean program was developed with their assistance. In light of the explosive end to the attempted nuclear negotiations between Iran and the United States, the country has become even more important as the sole power in the Islamic world with nuclear weapons.
In September 2025, the Pakistani government signed an agreement with the Saudi Arabian government to strengthen their alliance and in January of 2026, the Pakistani government announced plans for Turkey to join that alliance. The Saudis have a seemingly bottomless checkbook for weapons acquisition and a desire to project power in the Middle East. From watching Iran it has become abundantly clear that the path to do that is through a nuclear weapon. Ankara is also investing in military buildup, and with Israel telegraphing that it is likely to be in the country’s sights, the Turks have incentives of their own to secure better weapons. Pakistan has already demonstrated a willingness to play fast and loose with nuclear proliferation; why would they hold back when it comes to an alliance that the three parties see in civilizational terms?
The Saudis are in some sense seeing a long-term investment pay off. They host the largest Pakistani diaspora in the world, whose remittances are a significant part of Pakistan’s economy. There is a historical background as well; they funded seminaries in Pakistan for generations that have helped engender support for a more radical Islam in the country’s domestic politics. They’ve provided so much economic support that the country renamed one of the biggest cities in the Pakistani province of Punjab in their honor: Lyallpur was turned into Faisalabad in honor of then King Faisal of Saudi Arabia. In some sense, the alliance from last year was formalizing this arrangement. In another sense, the recent war makes that a lot more important.
Similar dynamics are at play with Turkey, even if the alliance is based more on defense than anything else. Ankara provides drones to Islamabad, including advanced ones like the Bayraktar TB2, and is looking at setting up factories for their domestic production within Pakistan. Given how important these weapons have been in recent wars, like those between Ukraine and Russia or Iran and the United States, Pakistan has a strong incentive to support Turkey’s industrial production and stand against those attempting to degrade it.
Given the extent to which nuclear power is the only real currency in the Middle East that prevents a country from being invaded, every country without a nuclear benefactor in their corner would be foolish to not pursue an alliance with a country that will either allow you to develop them or will credibly threaten to use them on your behalf. Luckily for the Saudis and Turkey, Pakistan fits the bill.
The post Pakistan’s Big Moment appeared first on The American Conservative.
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