The overtures that the US is making to Pakistan and the Saudi-Pakistan defence pact are developments that have some implications for India's strategic calculus.
President Trump's reasons for his tilt towards Pakistan are unclear. Is it as simple as feeling piqued that he was not given credit by India for brokering the ceasefire between India and Pakistan, which he thought would have made him eligible for the Nobel Peace prize that he is hankering for? Pakistan has played to his vanity by nominating him for the Peace prize and this has won him over.
What Is It With Pakistan?
This would still not explain why he is so enamoured of the Pakistan Army Chief, Asif Munir. Hosting him for lunch at the White House was unprecedented. He lauds Munir in his public statements, which is unusual. In doing so, he does not bother if it diminishes the status of Pakistan's Prime Minister. He seems to have some plans for Pakistan that he believes its army strongman can deliver. Was he unhappy that India clashed with Pakistan militarily and inflicted losses on it, which could derail his plans?
Crypto Trail Or Gaza?
These plans could have been either on the business side or of a regional nature. As for the business side, the crypto deal with Pakistan that Munir engineered, and which has benefited persons close to Trump, is widely spoken about. Trump, who has been signing critical materials deals with various countries, has been offered one by Munir too.
At the regional level, is it that India's attack when Trump was in Riyadh annoyed him because he had some plans for some joint exploration of resources in Pakistan in collaboration with Saudi Arabia? Was Trump giving personal attention to Munir over Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif because he had in mind a role for Pakistan in his plans for Gaza that only Munir could deliver? Was he thinking ahead, about Pakistan participating in a projected Gaza Stabilisation Force following a peace deal ? Was he also calculating that he could push Pakistan to join the Abraham Accords eventually?
The US has supplied a fresh consignment of AMRAAM missiles to Pakistan for its F16s. In his public statements, Trump has made it a habit to speak about India and Pakistan, and Modi and Munir, in the same breath. This kind of verbal hyphenation diminishes India and boosts Pakistan. Given Trump's desire to mediate between India and Pakistan, speaking about two countries together is a peep into his mindset.
Trump now wants to mediate between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Here again, it would seem that he wants to make Pakistan more secure in its neighbourhood. Whether he thinks a successful mediation can open the doors to the US re-possessing the Bagram base is a matter of speculation.
Whither Now?
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said recently that the US sees an opportunity to expand strategic ties with Pakistan. Already, Pakistan is a Major non-NATO Ally of the US. What would be the content of reinvigorated strategic ties between the two countries? A renewed effort to establish a strategic balance in the sub-continent, which has long been a US objective, but which was largely abandoned after the India-US nuclear deal and other bilateral developments with India?
Rubio says that renewed ties with Pakistan will not be at the expense of friendship with India. This is a line the US has also taken in the past to deflect India's concerns about US-Pakistan ties. Rubio believes India has a very mature diplomacy, adding rather strangely that India has "some relationships with countries that we don't have relationships with". One wonders which countries he has in mind. Cuba? Venezuela? Iran? North Korea?
The irony in this is that Pakistan has been involved in terrorist attacks on US soil, besides aiding the Taliban to regain power in Kabul at the cost of many US military casualties. As regards the maturity of Indian diplomacy, one would wish that this was reciprocated by a more mature US diplomacy towards India under Trump.
The US has now sanctioned Chabahar port (though a six month waiver has now been, announced). This favours Pakistan strategically as the step impedes India's access to Afghanistan, Gwadar is not undermined, and, ironically, China's strategic penetration into the Indian Ocean through Pakistan is aided.
Pakistan And The Gulf
Pakistan's relationship with the Gulf countries has been historically close. Pakistan has traditionally viewed Saudi Arabia as a benefactor. Islamic bonds have strongly underpinned the relationship. In the past, the Saudi monarchy had asked for Pakistani military detachments to be deployed on Saudi soil to provide security to the royals. It is widely suspected that Saudi Arabia even financed Pakistan's nuclear programme. The former Pakistan Army Chief, Raheel Sharif, was appointed the head of the Saudi-Arabia-led Islamic Military Counter Terrorism Coalition in early 2017, which had the mandate to unify Muslim countries against extremist ideologies.
In this background, the announcement of a Saudi-Pakistan defence pact is not altogether surprising. India has been aware that discussions on the subject had been taking place for some time. The Israeli attack on Doha despite Qatar hosting the largest US base in the region seems to have provided the right opportunity to unveil this pact. One can reasonably suspect a US green light for this defence pact as part of strengthening Pakistan's regional role in the perspective of exploring expanded strategic ties with Pakistan that Rubio has mentioned.
Pakistan, with radical jihadi groups operating on its own soil, numerous Pakistani individuals and groups designated as international terrorist by the UN, its role in assisting the Taliban to gain power in Afghanistan, and now combating without success the Tehreek-i-Taliban on its frontiers and engaged in clashes with the Afghan Taliban, has hardly the credentials to unify Muslim countries against extremist ideologies. Pakistan and Iran have clashed, too, over terrorist activities emanating from their respective soils, aimed at each other.
The Pact With Saudi
The Saudis are aware that Pakistan, Turkey and Malaysia, perturbed by the de-radicalisation agenda of the Saudi Crown Prince and the UAE monarchy, had attempted to forge a front of Islamic conservatism as a counter. The misunderstanding that this caused with Saudi Arabia seems to have been removed now. All this would indicate that Raheel Sharif's mandate is in reality a cover for the Saudi monarchy's continued reliance on the Pakistani military for internal security.
In this background, the announcement of a Saudi-Pakistan Strategic Mutual Defence Agreement in September 2025 was not altogether surprising. India was aware that discussions on the subject had been taking place for sometime. Nonetheless, its announcement came as a surprise, especially the collective defence clause stating that an attack on one is an attack on both. Coming after India's Operation Sindoor against Pakistan, this clause raised obvious questions about its import. This pact involves joint military training, intelligence sharing, defence production, and a commitment to deploy approximately 25,000 Pakistani soldiers for security and operations in Saudi Arabia in exchange for significant Saudi investment.
India And Riyadh
On the other hand, India sees the demonstrable strengthening of its ties with conservative Gulf monarchies as a major success of its foreign policy. In recent years, Saudi Arabia's relationship with India has grown stronger, with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman giving greater impetus to ties. The two countries have established a strategic partnership. Visits at the highest level, including military, have been exchanged in recent years. Defence cooperation has been on the agenda with the two sides holding army and naval exercises. Saudi Arabia is a major supplier of crude to India. It hosts 2.7 million Indian expatriates. Trade between the two countries stands at $ 43 billion (2003-24). Saudi Arabia is part of the India-Middle East -Europe Economic Corridor.
India immediately expressed reservations about the Saudi-Pakistan defence pact, stating that it would study its implications for its national security and for regional and global stability. It cautioned Riyadh by also stating that it would expect it to be mindful of mutual interests and sensitivities. To underlie its concerns, India firmly stated its commitment to protecting its national interests and ensuring comprehensive national security in all domains.
India Is In A Better Position Today
India does not believe that in a future conflict between India and Pakistan, Saudi Arabia would intervene militarily against India. It would hardly be in its interest to do so given the scope of its ties with India. With the huge size of its expatriate Indian population, it would also face a major internal crisis. India's concern could be that Saudi Arabia may provide funds to cash-starved Pakistan to procure weapons either from the US or China, especially to fill the gaps in its air defence systems and other weaknesses exposed during the recent clash with India. In other words, Saudi money could help bolster Pakistan's military capabilities, which are inherently directed against India.
India has flourishing ties with the UAE. It has always had close ties with Oman. India has been cultivating Qatar, which is the biggest supplier of LNG to India. Despite its defence pact with Pakistan, India will continue to make every effort to expand and deepen ties with Saudi Arabia, given its centrality in the affairs of the Gulf states, not to mention the links between Saudi Arabia as the custodian of Islam's holy sites and India's 200 million Muslim population, the massive Indian expatriate population there and the country being a major oil supplier to India.
The India-Middle East-Europe Trade corridor (IMET), currently stalled because the conflict in Gaza has negatively impacted the Abraham Accords that visualised a potential normalisation of ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel, has a vast connectivity element in it that can bolster the India-Gulf countries-Europe trade and other relations.. The Saudi-Pakistan defence pact has no salience as far as this project is concerned.
Why The Pact Is Concerning
However, the pact indeed raises Pakistan's regional profile and complicates India's effort to maintain the spotlight on Pakistan's terrorist affiliations, which were also responsible for triggering the Pahalgam attack and Operation Sindoor.
The talk that India's efforts to "isolate" Pakistan diplomatically is off the point. How can India do this given Pakistan's "lips and teeth" ties with China, its membership of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), which it exploits for anti-India propaganda, its status as Major non-NATO Ally of the US, its links with the UK establishment, its close ties with Turkey, its membership of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), its current membership of the United Nations Security Council, its contribution to UN peacekeeping forces, etc? India's attempt has been to try to isolate Pakistan on the issue of terrorism by drawing attention in various international forums to its involvement in terrorism as a matter of state policy. In this, India has made some gains. Virtually no country criticised India's military response to Pahalgam, implying that Pakistan's culpability was tacitly accepted.
(Kanwal Sibal was Foreign Secretary and Ambassador to Turkey, Egypt, France and Russia, and Deputy Chief Of Mission in Washington.)
Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author
