Can Pakistan play brother-in-arms role as Gulf states eye security shifts?
With its strategic location at the crossroads of Middle Eastern, Central and South Asian trade routes, its arsenal of combat-tested Chinese weapons and an army chief playing a high-wire diplomatic act, Pakistan is poised to play a security role in the Gulf. It's an interesting mix for some Gulf states questioning the US security commitment in the region – but not for all.
Issued on: 05/05/2026 - 20:08
9 min Reading time Share By: Leela JACINTO
Just hours after US President Donald Trump announced the Monday morning launch of “Project Freedom” that would see the US military guide ships through the Strait of Hormuz, Pakistan’s foreign minister was on the phone to his Iranian counterpart in Tehran.
Project Freedom, Trump noted in a social media post, was meant solely for ships “from areas of the World that are not in any way involved with that which is currently taking place in the Middle East”. The new US “humanitarian gesture”, Trump stressed, “is merely meant to free up people, companies, and Countries that have done absolutely nothing wrong”.
But not long after Pakistani Foreign Minister Mohammad Ishaq Dar got off the phone with Tehran, Islamabad had some surprising news related to the country at the heart of the current Middle East conflict. In a message posted on X, the Pakistani foreign ministry announced that it had facilitated the transfer of 22 Iranian sailors who were aboard the container ship Tosca, which was seized by the US last month.
“Pakistan welcomes such confidence-building measures and will continue to facilitate dialogue and diplomacy,” the statement added.
It was yet another diplomatic coup for Islamabad, which has emerged as a key mediator since the US and Israel launched a war on Iran. US audiences familiar with headlines that once called Pakistan “The Ally From Hell” have been waking up to presidential messages thanking Pakistan “and its Great Prime Minister and Field Marshal”, referring to military chief General Asim Munir, now dubbed “Trump's favourite field marshal".
Watch moreTrump's favourite field marshal: A profile of Pakistan's Asim Munir
While Pakistan’s diplomacy has been making a splash, the Iran war has also put the spotlight on the nuclear-armed South Asian nation’s security orientation in the Gulf region.
On April 11, as US Vice President JD Vance was leading negotiations with an Iranian team in an Islamabad hotel, a deployment of Pakistani military aircraft landed at Saudi Arabia’s King Abdulaziz Air Base. The aircraft, which included fighter and support jets, arrived in the oil-rich Gulf nation under the terms of a mutual defence pact, said the Saudi defence ministry.
The deployment came months after Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif signed a Strategic Mutual Defence Agreement in Riyadh on September 17, 2025. The signing ceremony came a week after Israel conducted missile strikes targeting Hamas officials in Qatar, a US ally and host to a major US base, underscoring Riyadh’s concerns over Washington’s commitment to Gulf defence and its failure to contain Israel’s actions in the Gulf region.
The Iran war has exacerbated those anxieties, increasing Pakistan’s relevance as a Sunni Muslim military power with ties to Shiite Iran, the US and China. It has also turned international attention to Pakistan’s strategic location at the crossroads of Middle Eastern, Central and South Asian trade routes, and whether it could have implications for regional security.
Building bridges after border clashes
With the US and Iran competing to block the vital Strait of Hormuz and win a war of words on social media, Pakistan’s role in securing an albeit tenuous ceasefire last month has been one of the few issues both sides can agree on.
Trump’s “Project Freedom is Project Deadlock”, scoffed Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi at the end of a day that saw an oil port in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) set ablaze by Iranian missiles while hundreds of commercial vessels remained stuck in the Strait of Hormuz. “As talks are making progress with Pakistan's gracious effort, the U.S. should be wary of being dragged back into a quagmire by ill-wishers,” Araghchi warned.
Even as the war drags on in its third month, Pakistan’s ability to balance its relations with Washington and Tehran has earned it respect in policy circles.
“Critics of Pakistan had claimed that Islamabad really was not doing much and that it was essentially an errand person, so to speak, that it was just passing messages and nothing more,” said Michael Kugelman, senior fellow at the Washington DC-based Atlantic Council. “But I think we've seen that over the last few weeks, Pakistan has emerged as a critical player in the diplomatic aspects of this crisis, and not just in terms of diplomacy, but also geopolitics.”
Meanwhile on Tuesday morning, Iranian state media IRNA reported that 15 of its 22 sailors in Pakistan had crossed into Iran through the Rimdan border terminal in Sistan and Baluchestan.
Iran’s Sistan and Baluchestan province borders Pakistan’s Balochistan province, where the Baloch people on both sides of the frontier have waged insurgencies against their respective capitals. The unrest has at times spiralled into border clashes between the two countries.
But since the last border clash in 2024, Islamabad has sought to build trust with Tehran, according to Kugelman. “In an era when Iran has struggled to develop close friendships with its neighbours, Pakistan has been a different story,” he noted.
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Chinese military ties and arsenal on display
Islamabad’s close ties to another neighbour, China, has been critical in Pakistan’s success at getting Iran to the negotiating table, notes Kugelman. “Pakistan has been able to get China's buy-in for the Islamabad peace process, and China has a lot of leverage over Iran. For Tehran, knowing that China is on board with what Pakistan is doing makes it more comfortable with Pakistan playing this prominent role in mediation,” he explained.
Pakistan’s arsenal of Chinese weapons, which passed their first combat test during the country’s deadly military engagement with India last year, has also “intrigued” Gulf nations seeking to diversify their procurements and protection amid growing disquiet over the US security commitment in the region, according to Bilal Khan, a Pakistan security expert and founder of Quwa Defence News.
Read moreChinese weapons pass combat test in India-Pakistan clash – with flying colours
Meanwhile Washington has sent mixed messages on China as Trump’s bid to end the Middle East war makes little progress.
Trump is scheduled to visit China on May 14 after postponing a summit with President Xi Jinping earlier this year due to the war. The Trump-Xi meeting is on track despite US concerns that Beijing may be trying to send Tehran dual-purpose materials through the US- blockaded Strait of Hormuz.
Last month, Trump said the US Navy had found material on an Iranian ship that was “not very nice” and perhaps “a gift from China”. But the US president sounded uncharacteristically forgiving in his response. “I was a little surprised but — because I have a very good relationship and I thought I had an understanding with President Xi,” he noted. “But that’s all right. That’s the way war goes, right?”
A mutual defence pact – with mutual limits
While Islamabad balances its relations with Tehran and Beijing, Field Marshal Munir, Pakistan’s powerful army chief, has proved famously adept at maintaining ties with the Trump administration.
“With a lot of the Pakistani military leadership's decisions, you have to assume that there is at least some awareness on the part of the US, if not some level of tacit support, or at least ambivalence on the part of the US,” said Khan.
So when Pakistan and Saudi Arabia signed the 2025 mutual defence pact, the details of which have not been released, many military analysts dismissed the move. “This agreement was signed likely with America's awareness. And if America didn't care, then there's probably nothing in it,” explained Khan.
At that time, the Pakistani prime minister’s office’s reiterated that the agreement “states that any aggression against either country shall be considered an aggression against both”. But while the language echoed the collective defensive pledge of NATO’s Article 5, in reality, Pakistan’s defence deals have never involved reciprocal military engagements. So, for instance, when Pakistan declared “open war” on Afghanistan earlier this year, the Saudis were not expected to, neither did they, enter the fray.
Read morePakistan-Afghanistan 'open war': How and why we got here
Neither did Pakistan, the world’s only Muslim nuclear power, rush to Saudi Arabia’s defence when Iran retaliation for the US-Israeli strikes included attacks on Washington’s Gulf allies. “As deep as this partnership is, there are some limits to how far it might be able to go,” said Kugelman. “Pakistan has tried to project itself as more of a neutral player in the Saudi Arabia-Iran dispute – and that has included trying to build better ties with Iran.”
It’s a neutral position that has strained Pakistani relations with the UAE, highlighting the rifts within the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) grouping of six Gulf monarchies.
Days after the Pakistani deployment of jets landed in Saudi Arabia last month, the UAE stunned Islamabad by demanding an immediate repayment of its $3.5 billion loan from its cash-strapped South Asian ally.
The Iran war has sparked policy differences in Gulf capitals facing the same security threat. While Oman, Qatar and Saudi Arabia have emerged as the key Gulf players seeking a diplomatic resolution, the UAE has pushed for a more aggressive approach, viewing the conflict as a zero-sum means to permanently weaken Tehran. The tensions spilled into the economic front last month, when Abu Dhabi withdrew from OPEC+, a cartel it has long criticised for favouring Riyadh.
“Pakistan's relationship with the UAE, one of its closest relationships in the Middle East, has become a casualty of this neutrality posture,” said Kugelman. “On the one hand, Pakistan's continued close relationship with Saudi Arabia, which include the defence pact, has spoilt ties with the UAE because of UAE-Saudi tensions. But at the same time, Pakistan's posture toward Iran has upset the UAE as well.”
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‘Micro personal’ gains
Islamabad has its own security reasons for being miffed with the UAE despite the close bilateral ties.
The Pakistani security establishment views Abu Dhabi’s deepening relations with Israel and arch foe India with deep suspicion. The UAE is part of the I2U2 grouping – consisting also of India, Israel, and the US – that is cooperating on various projects, including a proposed India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC).
Just two days before Israel and the US launched the war in Iran, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was plugging the IMEC project in a speech to the Knesset.
But the Iran war has seen India retract from the diplomatic stage, handing Pakistan a soft power win, particularly in the Global South. “India is always looking to undercut, if not isolate, Pakistan regionally and indeed globally. But instead, India is quiet while Pakistan has emerged as a critical mediator and has been getting all types of international attention and praise,” said Kugelman.
Analysts however warn that while the recent Middle East conflict has upped Islamabad’s profile, it fails to change the long-term dynamics for Pakistan or its people.
Field Marshal Munir’s critics have been quick to note that his high-wire diplomatic act fails to address the country’s deep economic problems. Khan notes that it’s unclear if it will earn Pakistan significant security gains in the long run. “A lot of it is resting at a more micro personal level,” he explains. “The benefits will mostly be felt by Asif Munir, the generals, the government and the top people. I don't think it's going to necessarily connect to anything from the wider framework of Pakistan's national security interests.”
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