A message has been sent through the Saudi-Turkish-Pakistani trilateral defense agreement, whose preparation took more than a year: that any assault on the security of the Gulf states ultimately means an assault on the security of the entire region. The signatory states deemed it necessary to send this message because they believe the region should be striving to achieve progress and put an end to chaos.
The agreement carries particular significance in its form, timing, and location. It was signed on a Friday, in Makkah, to send a message to those concerned. As the popular Gulf saying goes, the matter has “come to a head”: it has reached maturity, and there is no longer room to accept the status quo or these destructive wars. Iran must realize that its project is expansionist and surrounded by many irrational ideas.
Together, the signatory states possess considerable military equipment and manpower, and their combined GDP is estimated at $3.3 trillion. Pakistan overlooks the Arabian Sea, while Türkiye's presence in Somalia gives it a vantage point over the Red Sea, in addition to the economic strength enjoyed by the three countries and their influence in the international arena. Türkiye was the venue for a NATO meeting just weeks ago, while Pakistan has been active in mediating between Iran and the United States, as it is acceptable to both sides: it is not an enemy of the regime in Tehran, just as Türkiye's relationship with Iran is not hostile. Yet the persistent threat to the Gulf states has made everyone aware of the risks. The message to Tehran is that maintaining interests with you is not more important than preserving the security of the Gulf, and that continuing to threaten it has become unacceptable.
With this agreement, added to the agreement that preceded it by several weeks, the multinational defense alliance in the Red Sea, signed by fourteen states, with the door remaining open to any state wishing to join, the circle of deterrence is now complete. Saudi Arabia has taken an important step, one that many international strategists have long advocated and whose effectiveness has now been demonstrated: “encircling adversaries with friends.” The adversaries’ camp has become less capable of maneuvering, whether in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandab or in the Gulf basin.
The clearest message is that Iran’s dream of shaping the Middle East as it wishes must be seriously reconsidered, whatever it may say on its side about these strategic agreements. That Iranian dream of expansion and control is a disturbing one.
The message is also that the regional powers have grown weary of the Iranian regime’s chronic clashes with its surroundings, and that enough is enough. The Iranian peoples themselves have been exhausted before anyone else, as an attempt has been made to sell something that no one accepts, not even the Iranian public, which has taken to the streets more than once, at enormous cost, to say that what is happening is not only irrational but unacceptable to them. The Iranian opposition today, in all its different strands, both inside and outside the country, is growing, while the Iranian economy is nearing collapse.
Long and arduous efforts have been made to reach a settlement with Tehran. Each time, agreements are signed, even through the mediation of major powers friendly to Tehran, and then breached, for one reason or another. Some believe the problem lies in the multiplicity of centers of authority within the regime itself; others see it in the ideological rigidity driven by a closed sectarian political creed, which has produced a political mindset out of step with the times. Whatever the reasons, the result is the same: widespread destruction and sweeping chaos throughout the region, and, more recently, a mortal blow to the global economy.
Many states and societies have passed through a “revolutionary condition,” but after a time it became clear that the circumstances of revolution do not last, and that a practical, lived reality brings them into harmony, wholly or partially, with the world around them. This happened in the Soviet Union and China, among more recent examples, as well as in many historical cases. Yet after nearly half a century, Iran still does not want to recognize that its ideology is completely unacceptable and that it resembles a mirage: the closer it believes it has come to it, the farther away it becomes.
What lies before Tehran today is to change its behavior, respect its neighbors, and live in coexistence with them.
Last word: We await the day when Iran shakes the dust of the past from itself and lives among its neighbors in amity and peace.
