Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (C), Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (L) and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif signing the Mecca Joint Defence Agreement in Mecca, Saudi Arabia on August 7. The question is not whether Ankara and Islamabad are prepared to sign alongside Riyadh, but what they will do when Saudi Arabia comes under another attack from Iran or the Houthis, writes Bayethe Msimang.
Image: Pakistan Prime Minister's Office / AFP
The “Mecca Agreement” on joint defence, signed by Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Pakistan on August 7, has revived debate over the Middle East’s ability to forge a sustainable military alliance, particularly as the agreement stipulates that any armed attack against one of the three countries will be regarded as an attack against all three. Yet, according to international reports, the agreement still lacks many of the military and operational structures that would make this commitment effectively equivalent to Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty, according to Reuters.
The significance of the agreement lies not merely in bringing together three major Muslim countries, but in the question of whether it represents a genuine shift in the balance of power or another Saudi attempt to build a political and security umbrella following a series of failed regional experiences that did not achieve the objectives announced at their inception.
Critics of the agreement point to numerous precedents, beginning with the Arab League, the Arab Cooperation Council, and the Gulf Cooperation Council, and extending to attempts to establish an Arab NATO and the Islamic Military Alliance, whose creation Riyadh announced in 2015, as well as the more prominent coalition led by Saudi Arabia to wage war against the Houthis in Yemen that same year. Riyadh maintains that the coalition remains in existence despite the unannounced withdrawal of all participating countries. After 11 years of war, Saudi Arabia has failed to achieve any of its objectives and has failed to defeat an armed Yemeni movement.
The recurring problem was not the absence of declarations or agreements, but conflicting interests when crises emerged and Saudi Arabia’s failure to lead any alliance.
The Baghdad Pact itself eventually collapsed as a result of political transformations in Iraq and Iran, while Arab joint-defence projects remained far removed from the integrated military command structure found in NATO.
This dilemma is emerging once again in the Mecca Agreement. Turkey is a NATO member while maintaining extensive relations with Russia and Iran, while Pakistan’s military calculations are primarily shaped by its conflict with India. Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, has different priorities related to the security of the Gulf, Iran, and Yemen.
Even Pakistan, one of Riyadh’s closest historical military partners, previously placed clear limits on this relationship when its parliament rejected, in 2015, participation in the Saudi-led war in Yemen.
The Saudi-Turkish dispute is no less significant. The two countries competed for regional influence for years and differed over Qatar, the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, and Yemen, before moving in recent years toward reconciliation and cooperation. The Mecca Agreement therefore brings together three countries that need one another at this particular moment, but it does not mean that they have acquired a single strategic vision.
Turkish officials themselves have emphasised that the agreement is not directed against Iran or any specific country, despite being signed in a regional environment following repeated Iranian attacks on Saudi Arabia.
Here lies the paradox: the agreement presents a strong collective-deterrence formula on paper, yet the three partners do not identify a common adversary, while the existence of an agreed threat is one of the most important factors that has historically sustained the cohesion of long-term military alliances.
The agreement can also be viewed through the lens of Saudi domestic politics and the image of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Saudi Arabia today needs to reassert itself as a power capable of leading new regional arrangements after years of war in Yemen that failed to achieve the goal of eliminating the Houthis or ending the threat they pose to the kingdom. The latest Iranian attacks have also exposed the limits of Saudi deterrence and, according to international reports, raised questions about the traditional security umbrella on which Riyadh has relied.
Reuters noted that the agreement comes specifically amid regional turmoil and Iranian attacks on Gulf states, while other reports have pointed to a Saudi move toward seeking more independent security guarantees.
From this perspective, the Mecca Agreement can be viewed as serving a political and media function more than a military one: to recast and present Mohammed bin Salman as a leader capable of building blocs that bring together Turkish military power, Pakistani capabilities, and Saudi financial weight.
The importance of this image is heightened by the pressures facing the kingdom’s ambitious economic transformation projects, whose failure has become apparent and many of which have proven unrealistic after consuming tens of billions of dollars.
There is also a need to demonstrate that Riyadh remains capable of launching initiatives and leading regional arrangements, rather than appearing as a state seeking protection after its vulnerabilities vis-à-vis Iran and the Houthis have been exposed.
The Mecca Agreement appears to be merely a publicity-driven alliance, just as it would be premature to describe it as an Islamic NATO. Turkey and Pakistan already possess significant military capabilities, and defence cooperation already exists among the three countries. The new agreement may expand areas of training, intelligence, military manufacturing, and deterrence.
But regional history sets a stricter standard. The question is not whether Ankara and Islamabad are prepared to sign alongside Riyadh, but what they will do when Saudi Arabia comes under another attack from Iran or the Houthis. Will Turkey and Pakistan deploy their forces and bear the cost of a confrontation that does not directly serve their interests?
Only then will the true nature of the agreement become clear: Has Mohammed bin Salman succeeded in establishing a new security umbrella for Saudi Arabia, or will the “Mecca Agreement” become yet another alliance that succeeds in creating an image of power for an ambitious young prince who is more faltering and less experienced and capable than the image he seeks to project?
The question is not whether Ankara and Islamabad are prepared to sign alongside Riyadh, but what they will do when Saudi Arabia comes under another attack from Iran or the Houthis, writes Bayethe Msimang.
Image: IOL
** Bayethe Msimang is an independent writer, analyst and political commentator. *
*** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL.*
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