Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia may be seen as something of a pioneer on this front with the creation of the Islamic Military Alliance to Fight Terrorism in 2015, which was partly the basis for the recently concluded Makkah Joint defense Agreement. However, Pakistan has always championed such ambitions. The roots go much further back, with the Baghdad Pact representing an important milestone in that journey.

The concept of a collective Muslim response has been conceived and framed in different ways, from the idea of the ummah (Islamic community) to its more structured institutional expression within the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. Its character has continued to evolve as changing political objectives have redirected the ideological orientation of Muslim states.

In Pakistan’s case, however, this idea has shaped not only the country’s ideology but also its internal politics and models of state structure.

There is little doubt that Pakistan’s growing role in the Gulf, beginning with United States President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace plan, followed by the Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding and now the Makkah accord, has boosted the country’s confidence. However, when its leadership looks inward at the political and economic conditions, the contrast undermines some of the confidence gained from its successes in an evolving geopolitical environment.

This disparity frustrates the power elite that wants to address internal problems immediately and sustain the country’s momentum in the external arena.

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To achieve internal stability and order comparable to that in Saudi Arabia and Turkey, Pakistan’s other regional partners, the power elite here appears prepared to take several political risks. These could include major administrative engineering, such as the creation of new provinces, a step that would come at considerable political cost.

Pakistan is deepening its West Asian ties to bolster its defense power and strategic weight.

This argument is not intended to evaluate the costs and benefits of creating new provinces. Rather, it seeks to trace the trigger that makes the power elite nervous when its external successes do not correspond with domestic political realities and the state of the economy.

There can be several interpretations of this contradiction, ranging from the political economy to the changing geopolitical order. Yet an important dimension is often missing from the debate: the triangle of ideology, statecraft and geography.

Pakistan and Turkey share a geographical anxiety: their military power and ambitions do not fully correspond with the territories they control, while their opportunities for geographical expansion are extremely limited. This creates a middle-power anxiety about sustaining and enhancing their military and defense capabilities.

Both countries are responding to this challenge in their own ways. Turkey is pursuing regional groupings, alliances and transnational Turkic partnerships. Pakistan, meanwhile, appears to be abandoning its old strategy of “strategic depth” or the attempt to expand its influence to neighboring territories to overcome its geographical anxieties. Instead, it is engaging more deeply in West Asia to strengthen its defense capabilities and strategic weight. The purpose is obvious: Pakistan faces a much larger geographical and military power in India.

Saudi Arabia faces a different middle-power dilemma. Its primary concerns are sustaining economic stability and protecting itself from regional forces that it perceives as ideologically hostile or hegemonically ambitious, principally Iran and Israel. Saudi Arabia has learned to coexist with Israel, but Israel’s hegemonic ambitions continue to generate anxiety about the future regional order. Riyadh is also concerned about hostile forces near its borders, particularly in Yemen, where Iran has effectively projected its influence.

Pakistan is now going a step further by undergoing a state-centric ideological recalibration. This transformation does not yet match Saudi-style social liberalization or the secular-nationalist transformation associated with Nasser’s Egypt.

Pakistan is still struggling to find a clear direction. Its emerging model appears to combine Mohammed bin Salman’s state-controlled “moderate Islam”, the mutually reinforcing nationalism, military authority and state-regulated religious discourse of Abdel Fattah el-Sisi’s Egypt, and Turkey’s religious-conservative identity, nationalism and defense-industrial ambition.

Briefly, the power elite wants religion to remain under state authority. It seeks a transition from transnational Islamic solidarity to the national interest; the creation of a modern, technologically capable Muslim state; religious scholars who support national cohesion rather than challenge statecraft or the ambitions of the ruling elite; and centralized control over security and foreign policy.

However, the power elite also believes that the existing political order, governance model and constitutional arrangements obstruct the achievement of lasting stability. Interestingly, the Afghan Taliban, once close allies of Pakistan’s establishment, have taught it an important lesson: Islamist allies may possess their own nationalism, interests and territorial ambitions, which may not correspond with the vision of another country’s power elite.

Middle powers with complicated neighborhoods and significant defense capabilities often have additional strategic thoughts. They imagine renewed glory through alliances with friendly states possessing compatible capabilities and ambition. Major powers frequently exploit this tendency by encouraging middle powers to form alliances.

Washington is encouraging the emerging defense architecture that has taken shape through the Makkah accord. China and Iran, meanwhile, are waiting for the US to reduce its regional footprint before revealing or advancing their own designs.

The US and United Kingdom exploited this middle-power tendency several times during the Cold War. The Baghdad Pact was the most developed form of such an alliance. Established in the mid-1950s, it brought together Turkey, Pakistan, Iraq, Iran and the UK. However, the project eventually collapsed due to internal upheavals in Iraq and Iran, and Turkey also experienced domestic political instability.

At that time, Pakistan was considered the alliance’s most stable regional partner, with politics largely under control and an economy that appeared to be flourishing. Pakistan’s power elite still dreams of returning to those days of perceived glory and reclaiming the country’s position among the leading middle powers of the Muslim world.

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The writer is a security analyst and director of Pak Institute for Peace Studies (PIPS).

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