Bottom Line Up Front
The Makkah Pact, the joint defense agreement signed by Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Türkiye on August 7, 2026, met its first test within weeks. As the Saudi-led Operation Yemen Dawn pushed against the Houthis on the Red Sea coast, the Houthis struck Saudi airports and energy sites, Pakistani forces deployed to defend Saudi territory, and Iran began to look at Pakistan as a pact member it could make pay. This series follows the pact from its first test through the Gulf’s shifting alignments, and scores our own calls as it goes.
The Series
- Part 1 — The Makkah Pact’s First Test. Operation Yemen Dawn, Pakistan’s role and troop presence in the Kingdom, and Iran’s options for retaliating against Pakistan.
- Part 2 — The First Test, Tested. The Houthi strikes that closed Riyadh’s airport, Pakistan’s defensive red line, and an early score of Part 1’s forecasts.
- Part 3 — Strong in the Air, Weak on the Ground. Why Saudi Arabia, with one of the best-equipped militaries in the world, needed a pact at all.
- Part 4 — Diamond vs. Hexagon. Where Pakistan sits on Netanyahu’s new security map, and what the “Sunni Diamond” and the Israel-UAE-India “Hexagon” do and do not mean.
Companion Reading
- The Houthi Arsenal Goes Local: Chinese Parts and an Iranian Design
- Pakistan’s Iran Border Pause: A Trade Halt, Not a Sealed Border
- The Gulf Split: How Saudi Arabia and the UAE Broke, and What It Means for the GCC
How to Read It
Every judgment is confidence-tiered: CONFIRMED where independently documented, ASSESSED where it reflects CommandEleven Intelligence’s analytical judgment, and DATA DEFICIT where the record is silent. Calls with due dates are tracked and scored on the Foresight Record, misses included.
