Saudi Arabia, Türkiye and Pakistan signed the Mecca Joint Defence Agreement on 7 August, using language deliberately reminiscent of NATO’s own charter: an armed attack on one would be considered an attack on all.
Barely a month later, Saudi Arabia is again under sustained Houthi pressure, with a drone intercepted and destroyed south of Mecca on Tuesday before it could reach the holy city’s restricted airspace, the first such alert there since 2017. If the pact was designed to deter exactly this kind of aggression, this is the moment it was supposed to influence.
So far, deterrence has not obviously arrived. The Houthis have launched attacks across southern Saudi Arabia that wounded dozens of people, captured strategic territory along the Red Sea coast, and now threaten routes around Bab el-Mandeb, one of the world’s most important maritime chokepoints.
Saudi air defences have intercepted many of those attacks successfully, but interception is not the same thing as deterrence.
Deterrence Has Not Arrived Yet
The Houthis have not behaved like a group intimidated by a new collective-defence bloc. The group has also developed far beyond its origins as a local mountain militia, and now fields ballistic missiles, long-range drones and an estimated force of hundreds of thousands, supported technologically and militarily by Iran and Hezbollah.
That gives it the ability to threaten Saudi oil infrastructure, cities and shipping far beyond Yemen’s borders.
A defence pact succeeds most clearly when an adversary decides that launching the attack is no longer worth the consequences. That calculation does not yet appear to have changed.
Saudi-backed forces in Yemen have suffered serious setbacks even as the pact’s founding language promised collective consequences for exactly this kind of pressure.
Mecca Raises the Stakes
The attempted strike near Mecca gives the confrontation an unusually powerful symbolic dimension. Saudi military spokesman Turki al-Maliki called the drone incursion a hostile and terrorist attack, and declared the security of the two holy mosques and their pilgrims a red line.
The Houthis deny deliberately targeting Mecca or other religious sites, and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation separately condemned the incident as an attack on the sanctity of Islam’s holiest sites.
The symbolism is difficult to avoid because the defence agreement itself was signed in Mecca, its founding statement explicitly invoking Islamic solidarity alongside strategic interests and collective security. Pakistan has since described defence of Mecca and Medina as a responsibility carrying enormous emotional significance for its population, which makes the absence of an obvious allied military response particularly noticeable.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said Islamabad stood shoulder to shoulder with Saudi Arabia, but words of solidarity are easier than deciding what Article 5-style language means operationally.
Pakistan and Türkiye Stay Cautious
Pakistan initially appeared ready to answer that question firmly. Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said continued Houthi attacks could make the Mecca agreement operational and that Pakistan would honour its commitments if Saudi Arabia required assistance.
He also noted, more cautiously, that Mecca did not actually need an agreement to be protected, since safeguarding the holy sites was a duty regardless.
Türkiye and Pakistan say they have not received a formal request from Saudi Arabia for support under the pact at all, and both governments still need to complete their own domestic ratification procedures before the agreement carries full legal force.
Turkish officials say parliamentary approval may not happen until October, and one official admitted that shared operational plans, rules of engagement and coordination mechanisms between the three militaries “may take several years” to develop. Those are the foundations of an alliance, not yet a standing multinational force capable of responding automatically to every missile or drone attack.
Pakistan Has Its Own Constraints
Pakistan also has strong reasons to avoid being pulled directly into Yemen. Islamabad maintains relations with Iran and is trying to preserve a role in regional diplomacy, and open participation in military strikes against an Iranian-backed movement could damage that position.
Its military leadership has therefore emphasised that the pact has no regional aspirations and is intended for collective deterrence rather than confrontation with a particular country.
That distinction grows harder to maintain when the immediate threat to one pact member comes from a group closely aligned with Tehran. Pakistan also remembers the domestic controversy generated by the Saudi-led intervention in Yemen after 2015, when its parliament refused a Saudi request for direct Pakistani military participation, preferring neutrality in the conflict.
Türkiye faces a related calculation: Ankara wants closer defence cooperation with Riyadh and Islamabad while maintaining working ties with Iran, and an alliance presented explicitly as anti-Iranian would narrow its diplomatic room considerably.
Collective Defence Has Degrees
The pact therefore should not be judged only by whether Turkish or Pakistani aircraft immediately begin striking Yemen. Collective defence can include intelligence sharing, air-defence systems, logistics, weapons production, training and reinforcement of critical infrastructure, areas that may prove more important to Saudi Arabia than symbolic deployments.
The three governments have already established a permanent secretariat in Riyadh and agreed to expand joint defence production, while Pakistan and Türkiye possess capabilities Riyadh values in drones, missiles, air defence and military training.
A pact created in August cannot realistically produce fully integrated military command by September, but the stronger its founding language, the stronger the expectations it creates. Calling it a failure after little more than a month would be premature, since its institutions are still being built and the agreement may ultimately count for more through shared air defence and long-term deterrence than through dramatic intervention in Yemen.
Saudi Arabia signed an agreement saying an attack on one member would concern all three; Pakistan condemned the attacks, Türkiye backed solidarity, and Saudi forces did most of the actual defending. Collective defence turns credible only once adversaries understand what collective action will actually follow, and for now the Houthis appear willing to test exactly how much action lies behind the promise.
Keep up with Daily Euro Times for more updates
Read also:
The Houthi Movement Already Uses Frontier Software
Zainabiyyat: The Houthi’s Veil of Truth
Houthis Recruit Military Yemenis for Russian Frontlines in New Development
