Since independence and partition between India and Pakistan in 1947, the two states have fought multiple wars and remain conflicted over claims to Kashmir, border disputes, and terrorism. Over the last decade, India has moved from its historically secular approach to a more explicitly Hindutva-oriented political agenda, with growing concern over alleged discrimination against religious minorities. The Gulf Arab states are Muslim-majority states like Pakistan, with varying degrees of religious conservatism, yet they deal with both rival states by separating economic trade, security interests, and religious affiliations, while prioritizing their own geostrategic realities.
The true value of Pakistan’s security proposition will depend on whether military capability can be converted into credible and timely action.
India and Pakistan bring distinct propositions to the table. India offers economic volume, technology, investment, connectivity, and a huge consumer market. Pakistan offers military expertise, asreinforced through the 2025 Strategic Mutual Defense Agreement with Saudi Arabia, and the recent signing of the Mecca Joint Agreement with Saudi Arabia and Turkey, described in some media, perhaps prematurely, as the “Islamic NATO.” For decades, Pakistan’s military personnel trained and served alongside Gulf Arab armed forces, particularly in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Largely afflicted by fiscal pressures, Pakistan benefited from Gulf Arab financial assistance, energy supplies, and employment opportunities for millions of Pakistanis. Stronger Gulf Arab ties can provide Pakistan with investment and diplomatic space while reinforcing its position as a relevant security actor beyond South Asia.
Pakistan’s emerging security role in the region cannot be a substitute for American security guarantees, but its military capabilities, status as a nuclear power, and capacity to deploy trained defense personnel can provide deterrence for the Gulf Arab states. Yet Pakistan faces considerable economic and political constraints, and terrorist groups operate within its borders. The true value of Pakistan’s security proposition will depend on whether military capability can be converted into credible and timely action. The Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia and the deteriorating security situation across the Red Sea are already testing whether their collective defense commitments can translate into operational deterrence.
The Gulf Arab states founded their relationship with post-partition India on energy, trade, and the labor millions of Indian workers. For India, these Indian guest workers were a major source of foreign exchange through remittances, strengthening India’s balance of payments. India today has shown economic growth and is a source of technology, services, pharmaceuticals, engineering expertise, and investment. In February 2026, India and the Gulf Cooperation Council began negotiating a free-trade agreement, aiming to expand trade in goods and services, investment, and economic cooperation. Their relationship is moving beyond the traditional oil-for-labor model. For Gulf Arab governments pursuing grandiose national visions seeking economic diversification, India can contribute to critical strategic sectors. India’s relationship also derives from its wider ambitions in the Indian Ocean and the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor.
The Gulf Arab states cannot choose between Indian economic power and Pakistani military expertise. Their needs have changed significantly since the U.S.-Iran conflict, and current Strait of Hormuz disruptions have revealed that even extensive U.S. security partnerships cannot safeguard Gulf Arab state vulnerability. They need investment and deterrence, technology and military capacity, markets and maritime security, energy partnerships, and food security. The conflict shows that no single external partner can provide and guarantee all their needs.
Therefore, they pursue multi-alignment with China, India, Pakistan, Turkey, Europe, and other powers. This strategy is not necessarily anti-American, but a response to perceived uncertainty and their own vulnerability relative to their U.S. partnership. The Gulf Arab states are increasingly seeking relationships based on specific capabilities rather than exclusive alignment. They are not necessarily balancing against the United States but hedging between American air and missile defense, Indian technology, Pakistani military expertise, Chinese trade and infrastructure and Turkey’s defense support, while trying to retain their own diplomatic channels with Iran.
The historic rivalry between India and Pakistan potentially can extend to the region and produce another layer of fragmentation within the Gulf Arab states.
Understanding this is central to U.S. strategic interests. India’s growing role in the region intersects and even complements America’s own Indo-Pacific strategy. Pakistan requires a different calculation, since Pakistan balances commitments with Saudi Arabia and Turkey with its own security priorities toward India, Iran, and Afghanistan. Turkey further adds a major defense-industrial and technological angle to the nexus. Multi-alignment could also produce overlapping security commitments, divergent technology standards, interoperability issues, and competing external obligations, rendering collective action impossible. The historic rivalry between India and Pakistan potentially can extend to the region and produce another layer of fragmentation within the Gulf Arab states, especially considering the huge Indian and Pakistani diaspora living within them.
The strategic dilemma for the Gulf Arab states is no longer about which outside power can secure the region but how they can hedge multiple partnerships without becoming dependent on any one of them. Therefore, the Gulf Arabs are not simply diversifying their suppliers, but rather, diversifying their strategic relationships to survive in a volatile geographical environment. The Gulf Arab states might hedge their bets between Pakistan and India on an issue-by-issue basis, but they are not read to fully commit exclusively to one or the other.
