Mecca Accord

Its all about the money, honey!!!

This defence pact is between 3 Islamic nations, who are majorly Sunni. They all have strained relations with Israel – “officially”. Barring for Turkey the other two don’t recognise Israel officially. On the other hand, they are all linked to Iran by the Islamic religion but divided by the Sunni/ Shia divide.

• Saudi Arabia has the USA security umbrella and a nuclear energy deal.
• Turkey is a part of NATO.
• Some Gulf states have signed the Abraham accord, resumed diplomatic relations with Israel and Saudi Arabia is being pressurised to join in.
• Pakistan is supposedly brokering peace between Iran and USA/Israel, is the 3rd leg of this accord even as it strengthens its trade with Iran.
• POTUS Donald Trump has given a thumbs up to this alliance even as USA moves its last aircraft carrier from the Asian region to the Gulf leaving the region free for the Chinese.

This complicated broth makes the situation complex and its early days to hazard a guess on the future. The key comment in the joint declaration is what makes it intriguing. Where does Pakistan fit in and why?

Before we delve in to what may happen, let’s see what the 3 nations bring to the table.

1. Saudi Arabia provides petro dollars, economic resources, and critical energy assets.
2. Turkey contributes advanced conventional defence technology, industrial capacity, drone systems and brings the NATO experience to the alliance.
3. Pakistan can contribute military manpower, muscle memory and its nuclear capability.

A perfect combination one might say with some calling it the Islamic NATO, others a Sunni NATO but who is the potential enemy here?

• Pakistan has only one real enemy – India.
• Saudi Arabia/Turkey have lived with Israel/Iran since long, have differences, but are not exactly mortal enemies.

When the statement talks of an attack on one to be considered as an attack on all, how is it likely to play out in the real world? With just one personal anecdote, from 2009, the real world apparently works differently.

Participating in a global defence expo in Abu Dhabi, an Indian friend of mine had a booth from his parent company in USA which in turn was owned by Israel. A top military officer from Saudi Arabia walked in and started talking, discussing their product and was not exactly “friendly”. We could sense it. After a brief discussion, he suddenly confronted my friend saying that he/his company were from Israel. If this became public knowledge, my friend could have been jailed/deported – who knows. My friend, now sweating, was trying his best to convince him that he worked for a USA company and the Indian branch was participating. The military chap didn’t agree and played with him like a cat with a mouse. Suddenly the chap broke into a huge smile, winked, and said something like “I know you are an Israeli company, relax and enjoy the show. We do business but not officially” and walked away. 2026 is no different as a quick online search gives you this feedback.

Let’s analyse the scenarios.

Likelihood of war between

1. Saudi Arabia/Turkey and Iran/ Israel? Unlikely.
2. Saudi Arabia/Turkey and India? Highly unlikely.
3. Pakistan and India? Very likely.

• Who brings military muscle memory with field combat experience into this equation? Pakistan though Turkey isn’t far behind.
• Any which way you look at this, probability of Turkey/ Saudi Arabia needing Pakistan to come rushing with men/machines to protect them in a war seems slim.
• If Pakistan goes to war against India – how likely are Saudi Arabia/ Turkey to come rushing to their aid? If so with what? Men? Machines? Money?

Let’s analyse the various economic relationships.

• In the last 15 years Saudi Arabia has propped up Pakistan with about 30+ Billion dollars of cash to help in balance-of-payments crises, loan rollovers, and subsidized energy.
• Turkey has extended minimal cash support, but has actively supported Pakistan with defence technology, ammunitions and equipment supply including Drones worth a few Billion dollars. In Operation Sindoor in 2025, Turkey supplied drones that were used to attack India, and affected the India Turkey relationship.

Trade and investment of

• Turkey with India is less than 350 million dollars.
• Saudi Arabia with India is upwards of 10 billion dollars, a pledge of 100 billion dollars in investments, partnership in the Indian Middle East Europe trade corridor, investments in Reliance and other energy/food/automotive sectors. Further there are around 3 million Indians (and an equal number of Pakistani) living in Saudi Arabia.

China is very much a factor in this puzzle.

Trade between

1. China and Turkey are upwards of 50 billion dollars though the investment is far lower.
2. China and Saudi Arabia are upwards of 100 billion dollars while investment is over 70 billion dollars.
3. China and Pakistan is upwards of 20 billion dollars with similar investment figures, but more than 80% of the Pakistani military hardware is supplied by China.
4. China and India is upwards of 150 billion dollars though investments are poor.

• Given the level of economic involvement between India/Saudi Arabia/China – 250 to 350 billion dollars as compared to 50 billion dollars between Pakistan/Saudi Arabia/ China - it’s a no brainer as to where the dice will likely fall if it comes to directly getting involved in a war between India and Pakistan.
• Consequently, in a war between India and Pakistan, the financial or military equation between Pakistan and other three will not be any different from what it already is from an Indian viewpoint.
• China at best could needle India. China is unlikely to get involved in any war globally unlike USA. They are likely to remain focussed militarily in their surrounding geography, do some sabre rattling in far off waters using submarines but in general simply buy the required influence. China has no combat experience since 1979 and today the entire gamut of their military leadership have no field level combat experience.

So, who benefits from this Mecca agreement?

In recent times USA under Trump has turned every foreign policy, every relationship on its head and this is happening continuously. Nobody knows where this will settle and what the new equilibrium will be. The world as we know it has changed - most will be rescued but not all.

1. In recent times, Iran changed the rules of war to attack Saudi Arabia, UAE and everybody around them to extract an economic cost from the world.
2. Saudi Arabia since 2019 when Iran attacked them has seen inadequate military support from USA. But they cannot get into the military bed with China, as replacing hardware is too complex and historically China have never got involved in a war away from its shores.

Gulf Diplomacy

• Energy supplies have been disrupted, and USA has added to this mess with its own hidden agenda to get global buyers to buy from USA.
• The effectiveness of the USA protection umbrella has been tested to the extreme and has not lived up to expectations.
• Saudi Arabia is desperate for a way out without having to sign the Abraham accord and one way could be to have a no-war pact with Iran or sign the accord.
• UAE has already embarked on its own journey globally, recently quit the OPEC. It signed up for a strategic oil reserve in India in 2018, has more than 500 million dollars’ worth of stocks in India, and increasing that to around 3 billion dollars.

Any which way one looks at this Mecca accord, the chances of Saudi Arabia/ Turkey doing something very different from what they have been doing all these years when dealing with Pakistan is unlikely to change – even in an India Pakistan war. Saudi Arabia benefits from India as a long-term buyer and don’t have absolute leverage over India.

On the other hand, in the event of a Saudi Arabia/ Turkey war with Iran, Pakistan will need to think thrice before jumping in. Pakistan shares a 1,000 kms border with Iran, which is adjoining Baluchistan and if they chose to send men/machines to Saudi Arabia, can find themselves stretched, since Iran can attack them directly. Baluchistan can revolt, Afghanistan can needle Pakistan and let’s not assume that India will not stir this pot.

In short, this “attack on one, attack on all” statement is a major headache for Pakistan if they decide to follow it letter and spirit. But Pakistan isn’t exactly stupid.

Pakistan history will show that starting with the Kashmir issue in 1947 when they did a sleight of hand deal with Britain, they converted that into official foreign policy strategy. Subsequently they got involved in the Russia-Afghanistan conflict by becoming the “service providers” to the Americans. They perfected this art where they insert themselves into every issue and for a fee enjoy the ride without doing anything substantive. They often play both sides like with Osama Bin Laden and don’t think the Americans didn’t know that! Money speaks and if one is sharing the loot, nobody will act holier than thou till they have milked the situation dry.

Pakistan does not chase glory, fame, credit, pride, etc and for a fee, willingly be the performing monkey except that, the folks paying the fee are the actual monkeys. Pakistan is the one laughing all the way to the bank and if they can do that – they are least bothered about anything else. I have often said that “global blackmail” is an art in Pakistan, and they are the world’s best “snake oil” salesmen.

If a nation really had so much mineral wealth, funny that in 80 yrs they have preferred to remain poor

The tragedy is that the buyer is aware and knowingly goes ahead with every deal since any success they get the credit, fame and political glory, but any failure, Teflon Pakistan walks away laughing. Remember the latest peace deal between USA and Iran that Pakistan brokered? Even the SM posts of the Pakistan PM were drafted by USA. Nobody is laughing at them, but their smile is a mile wide.

• This Mecca deal is just one more such “snake oil” deal. Saudi Arabia and Turkey show that they are going to reduce security dependence on USA.
• They don’t officially join the Chinese camp. But thanks to Pakistan will get indirect Chinese military assistance since Pakistan will now “need” to buy more from the Chinese to support this alliance.
• India, finding that Pakistan is beefing up their armed forces will now buy more from USA, Europe.
• Trump and USA/ Europe are happy.
• Saudi Arabia and Turkey can now use this as a leverage to put some pressure on USA for some other concessions.

1. Pakistan will now milk Saudi Arabia, Turkey, China, USA for money for various reasons and as usual laugh all the way to the bank. 
2. A start could be to partner Saudi Arabia for strategic oil reserves in Gwadar port, Pakistan. 
3. That way the port gets global insurance in any war with India, the business is a bonus. 

Just study the map below to understand the significance.

A quick reading of this will give wider significane to what is said above.

The Economic Rationale

Its all about the money honey - QED