The previously concluded and now cancelled US-Iran Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) revealed a paradox at the heart of the Middle East security landscape. Both sides have been negotiating back and forth on de-escalation, a compromise on enriched uranium, and freedom of passage through the Strait of Hormuz. However, beneath these ongoing diplomatic efforts is a reality that is becoming increasingly clear. For the Iranian regime, a regional environment of managed conflict is more strategically valuable than a sustained peace agreement. This explains why, even after signing the 60-day ceasefire memo, Iran still attacked ships in the Strait of Hormuz, prompting the U.S. to respond to discourage future Iranian violence.

Iran will likely avoid a full-scale war that risks its destruction, instead preferring a continued proxy-driven, tension-filled regional environment to maintain deterrence and project power without escalation. Recent talks on uranium and safe passage through the Hormuz Strait will fuel Iran’s resistance to normalization with the U.S. and GCC.

Instability As a Strategic Infrastructure

For Iran, pushing for regional instability or proxy confrontations is not merely a temporary policy dispute. It has become embedded in the state’s architecture itself. Iran has built and framed its domestic popularity and regional legitimacy around the concept of resistance against Western pressure, particularly from the U.S. and Israel. This narrative was deeply institutionalized within Iran’s regional strategy, military doctrine, and its main controlling security establishments, the IRGC and Basij forces. In this regard, a comprehensive peace deal with the U.S. would create profound structural questions inside Iran, including the rationale of the “resistance” doctrine in place for decades, the logic of maintaining extensive regional proxy networks, and preserving a missile- and drone-heavy militarized regional posture.

In different ways, a controlled conflict has become part of the regime’s survival and operating environment. Therefore, achieving a sustainable peace agreement can entirely destabilize internal balances of power more than maintaining them. This explains why, even during periods of increased international diplomatic efforts, Iran often preserves parallel escalation mechanisms in addition to never conceding any of its nuclear program development to date. Thus, pursuing negotiations alongside adding pressure on multiple fronts is not a contradiction within Iranian strategic thinking. Instead, they are complementary tools.

The Asymmetric Leverage

Iran’s ability to threaten and demonstrate control over maritime access to the Strait of Hormuz negatively impacted global oil markets and exposed the vulnerability of international energy flows to customer states. In this respect, around one-fifth of global oil flows transit through the Strait of Hormuz, making it one of the most globally strategic water passages. Accordingly, the ongoing Hormuz crisis reinforces Tehran’s preference for controlled instability.

Iran uses the Hormuz situation to benefit itself domestically and internationally, framing it to show that strategic, asymmetric disruptions give diplomatic leverage. Even after military pressure, the U.S. remains focused on negotiations to reopen Hormuz and restore shipping stability. This is Iran’s leverage that it does not want to cede. Tehran, specifically the IRGC, which appears to be the decision-making authority, believes that maintaining control of Hormuz but avoiding escalation preserves its bargaining power, especially since hardliners see concessions to the U.S. as losses. Iran wants full control of the Strait, knowing it cannot fight the U.S. directly, and employs asymmetric leverage to influence the strategic balance.

Iran’s air force and navy remain significantly limited compared to those of the U.S. and regional GCC states. Additionally, Iran’s economy suffers under sanctions and American quarantines. As a result, Tehran has spent decades developing a different form of deterrence, including ballistic missiles, drones, proxy warfare networks, and regional escalation networks across Iraq, Lebanon, and Yemen. Among Iran’s regional proxy groups, Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen remain one of the most critical factors in Iran’s current asymmetric model of confrontation. Since the start of the U.S.-Israeli confrontation with Iran, the Houthis have so far chosen not to fully participate in ground fighting. This is particularly concerning because the Houthis are currently Iran’s most strategically positioned proxy group in the Middle East, armed with a wide range of missiles and drones, capable of inflicting strategic damage across the Red Sea and Bab el Mandeb and potentially causing another global maritime shock like Hormuz. This allows Iran to effectively deploy a multi-chokepoint strategy at any time. Alongside their threat to maritime security, the proximity of the Houthis to GCC states and the group’s history of fighting Saudi Arabia from 2015 to 2022 give Iran additional leverage to pressure the region.

This asymmetric model works best for Iran when geopolitical friction persists. Even without fully going into a conventional war with the U.S., Iran can complicate Western military planning and generate political costs for its opponents. Therefore, a stable regional order with normalized relations would significantly reduce the strategic utility of all these tools.

Deterrence and The Regime Survival Dimension

Iran’s broader regional strategy relies heavily on maintaining a “forward proxy defense” doctrine beyond its borders to project influence. This approach has served several purposes simultaneously, including creating multiple escalation fronts and increasing the political cost of directly attacking Iran. From Tehran’s perspective, a low-level regional friction prevents the emergence of a fully consolidated anti-Iranian security order.

There is also an internal political dimension that Western analyses often overlook. For example, external confrontations in the hybrid warfare narrative, which often bolster regime unity as periods of increased confrontational pressure enable the Iranian leadership to suppress dissent and rally nationalist sentiment. They frame this to their local population as the West’s war on Islam, aligning it with the state’s ideological identity, deeply rooted in anti-Western and resistance narratives. An internationally accepted peace agreement with the U.S. could lead to unwanted domestic effects for Iran, such as reduced ideological cohesion and increased demands for broader political reforms. Ironically, a limited confrontation might seem safer for regime stability than reaching a peace agreement.

Regional Peace, Security, and Iran

During the recent confrontation, which culminated in April’s ceasefire, more than 80 percent of Iran’s missiles and drones were directed at GCC states. This suggests Iran was willing to strike neighboring countries outside the immediate conflict even though they were not directly fighting with Iran. Such actions undermine regional trust and raise questions about Iran’s willingness to function as a responsible contributor to regional security.

The central paradox of any U.S.-Iran negotiations is that peace itself will threaten some of the strategic foundations upon which Iran has operated for decades. Regional instabilities and relatively managed conflicts provide Tehran with bargaining leverage, geopolitical relevance, and a degree of deterrence it seeks to demonstrate. A sustained peace deal, by contrast, risks reducing Iran’s asymmetric advantages that it has been trying to capitalize upon while also exposing its internal political and strategic vulnerabilities. The U.S. must recognize this reality or risk negotiating without a clear understanding of Iran’s strategic intentions.

Dr. Mohamed ELDoh is a business development and consulting professional in the defence and security sector. Mohamed holds a Doctorate from Grenoble École de Management, France, an MBA from the EU Business School, Spain, and an Advanced Certificate in Counterterrorism Studies from the University of St Andrews, UK. He regularly authors articles addressing defence cooperation, counterterrorism, geopolitics, and emerging security threats in the Middle East and Africa. The views of the author are his own.

Iran’s Strategic Logic of Instability was originally published on Global Security Review.

For the geopolitics of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), it is a time of great anxiety. With the non-Arab actors engaging in another tense series of regional infighting, coercive diplomacy and modern warfare have halted episodic interventions from the Arab counterparts. The MENA high-fliers have moved from their traditional stances of diplomatic arrangements and prioritized military readiness in the current spiraling crisis. For decades, the dominant challenge for the Arab nations has not been Israel’s aggression nor Iran’s ambitions, but their inability to sustain collective agreement in coalitions. The MENA region has seen countless alliances fracturing over the years, resulting in a region without one superpower. If the Gulf states continue to rely on the United States’ changing focus in the Middle East, it will end up losing more than its economic potency and military confidence. It will lose the ability to arrange the chessboard.

The inability of the Arab world to synchronize with its proximate neighbors has weakened the prospects of creating a counterintelligence structure in regional flare-ups. Is staying mutually vulnerable to modern intelligence operations a mistake worth repeating in traditional alliances?

To mitigate conflict spillovers, the Arab nations have prioritized active defense investments and air denial practices. Systematic defense procurements have streamlined their multi-domain operations to prevent entanglements, but out-spying Iran’s asymmetric warfighting or Israel’s intelligence warfare remains a political test. Israel’s intelligence directives of movement profiling and persistent surveillance of the Supreme Leader highlight the necessity to advance intelligence methodologies. MENA’s defensive architecture requires an additional protective layer over deterrence: counterintelligence. Not synchronizing against a common enemy caused several problems: domestic fracturing, outdated doctrines, historical distrust, and interoperability gaps. Investing rapidly in modern war equipment has erased the Arab world’s warfighting inferiority. Still, the mismatch continues to exist in indigenous productions of air defenses, military intelligence, and technical expertise. Despite inter- and intra-regional strategic connections existing as a starting point, the underlying factors of alliance fragmentation have increased.

Consistent strategic differences are fracturing the prospects of political reconciliation and strategic retrospection. Facing multiple power projectors, shared security architecture has reshaped how the geography collaborates during political flare-ups. MENA’s high-fliers see this geography without one dominant actor. This vacuum has yet to be filled, but complete dominance requires incremental layering, which Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the UAE, and Iran seek. The Gulf’s current strategy to combine deterrence with diplomacy has been met with historical, geopolitical tests. From Kuwait (1990) to Bahrain (2011), this geography has had its fair share of regional adventures. The fear of exposing warfighting weaknesses has halted political adventures in MENA. Aside from weak engagements in Yemen and Syria, and confused performances with Israel and Iran, the geopolitical awareness to arrange the Middle East offers a

complex silver lining. The ongoing crisis demands more than a cohesive block from the Gulf. Moving in line with other MENA actors invites multidimensional risks, gambles, and prospects in managing the evolving theater.

Israel’s versatile intelligence alters political entanglements for the Gulf. It introduced a hybrid wave of targeted psychological operations (PSYOPS). The open presence of Israel’s intelligence in the Middle East has resulted in its neighbors’ doctrinal fatigue. This ‘eye in the sky’ layering impacts the susceptibility, vulnerability, and recoverability of MENA’s doctrinal postures. It pushes the Persian Gulf to enhance battlespace in three settings: Iran’s predictive intelligence, the Gulf’s threat assessment, and integrated weapons systems. Still, the absence of collective military intelligence and interoperability is glaring.

To keep a watchful eye on regional aggressors, the Gulf adopted a threefold approach, by formalizing passive defense, security clusters, and proactive diplomacy. With multiple doctrines, MENA struggles to succeed in collectively preserving power, let alone projecting it. Be it Iran or Israel, a common pattern in the Gulf Cooperation Council’s (GCC) strategic behavior was observed. It preferred personalized military innovations and investments, while securing inter-regional strategic alliances. From the Levant to North Africa, the GCC to Iran, and Tukey to the broader Middle East, this reality articulated the disconnected objectives. However, the Gulf’s common direction to domestically upgrade remained constant, and it offers three scenarios for a future strategy.

First, to become innovative by forming a layered intelligence coalition with regional military sectors in different geographical quadrants, making Five Eyes a blueprint to align domains, departments, and systems. Second, to continue investing in personalized, ad-hoc security investments before active defense localization. In the current situation, this strategy provided the Gulf with ample psychological and operational confidence to fuse other arrangements together. Third, use the previous geopolitical arrangements of MENA to innovate. The Middle East Strategic Alliance (MESA) was the rump administration’s idea to bring the Arab states together for a joint cause: unifying against Iran. The Qatar blockade and Egypt’s withdrawal soured the idea MESA became a memory. Therefore, the prospects of coordination by cross-regional powers require a consensus.

Currently the urgency to upgrade counterintelligence structures is neither lacking incentives nor temptations. The urgency to innovate in multiple spheres of traditional power is a matter of strategic inevitability. MENA has found a cogently balanced geostrategy to maneuver in multidirectional geopolitical dimensions. Natural resources, chokepoints, and trade passages give significant bargaining chips to MENA. It has shaped its strategic profile to constructively depend on geostrategic positioning. Using traditional elements of power with natural commonalities and conditionalities offers alliance politics. In a not-so-friendly neighborhood, finding common ground remains an Achilles ‘ heel. Bringing elements of confidence-building from inter-regional coalition lessons is one go-to strategy.

Muhammad Hamza Chaudhary is a student of International Relations at the Department of Political Science, University of the Punjab, Lahore, Pakistan. He has published his work in the Small Wars Journal, Modern Diplomacy, and the Center for Strategic and Contemporary Research (CSCR). The views of the author are his own.

A Counterintelligence Profile: Are High-Fliers Ready? was originally published on Global Security Review.

(Editor’s Note: This article was submitted before the U.S.-Iran conflict began. We intentionally left the article as “forward looking” to signify the value of the analysis.)

The Red Sea theater sits in a fragile equilibrium. Commercial shipping lines have cautiously begun returning to the Suez corridor after months of rerouting around the Cape of Good Hope. Insurance premiums remain elevated but are no longer crisis-level. Western naval task forces maintain a visible deterrent presence. Meanwhile, the Houthis continue to signal both restraint and readiness. The question is no longer whether the Red Sea crisis of 2024-2025 can return. The question is what specific trigger conditions will lead to its return. Accordingly, the escalating U.S.-Israeli-Iranian confrontation will make the Houthis resume maritime attacks, if not also targeting different spots of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).

The earlier claims about trench networks around Hodeidah, Yemen and coastal missile positioning, whether fully verified or partly exaggerated, fit within a broader pattern: the institutionalization of a long-term defensive and deterrent posture by the Houthis along Yemen’s western coastline. When combined with February 2026 reporting that maritime traffic is resuming but threats persist, a clearer strategic picture emerges. This is not a de-escalation. It is a structured pause under tension.

The Current Operational Baseline

This month, several dynamics defined the Red Sea environment. This included the cautious resuming of shipping traffic via the Suez route; major new Houthi missile or drone strikes on international vessels were not confirmed in this window, and Western naval forces remained deployed. However, Houthi rhetoric tied potential future maritime action to broader regional developments, particularly U.S.-Iran and Israel-related escalation scenarios. In this respect, the Houthis have announced that they will resume attacks on ships in the Red Sea.

The absence of active strikes should not be misread as capacity degradation. Instead, it reflects a conditional deterrence posture.

The Houthis have demonstrated in prior cycles that they calibrate attacks based on political timing rather than purely military opportunity. That suggests that the past few months’ relative quiet has been strategic, not structural. The Houthis were only preparing more for a bigger scale of maritime attacks.

Hodeidah and Coastal Entrenchment: Defensive Depth as Strategic Signaling

Whether or not the claims of the Houthis’ trench dimensions are independently verified, the logic behind coastal fortification is consistent with Houthi behavior. Hodeidah serves multiple functions for the Houthis. It serves as a coordination hub, a political stronghold, and a strategic maritime access point as well as a symbolic center of resistance. If significant defensive works are underway or expanded, they serve three interlocking objectives.

Firstly, for the purpose of anti-assault preparation, large-scale trenches are classic anti-armor and anti-vehicle barriers. They complicate any amphibious or ground-based incursion supported by regional actors. Secondly, for the purpose of airstrike mitigation, defensive depth complicates targeting and disperses assets such as mobile launchers. When it comes to psychological signaling, massive projects communicate permanence. They project the message: “We are not a temporary militia. We are entrenched.” The current environment, characterized by paused attacks but intact infrastructure for renewed confrontation, aligns with this.

Iran-U.S. Tensions as Activation Factor

The strategic linkage between the Houthis and Iran remains central to forecasting. While the Houthis maintain operational autonomy, their Red Sea campaign historically synchronized with broader regional escalation cycles involving the U.S. and Israel. The emerging rhetoric linking maritime threats to wider geopolitical friction suggests a conditional doctrine: The Red Sea is a pressure valve for the Houthis as directed by Iran.

If the U.S.-Iran tensions spike, whether via direct strikes on Iranian assets or Israeli escalation involving Iran-backed actors, then the Red Sea becomes a low-cost, high-visibility response domain. This makes the Red Sea maritime security in 2026 structurally fragile.

Maritime Deterrence Architecture in 2026

Western naval presence in the Red Sea has shifted from reactive escort to semi-permanent deterrence architecture. The key characteristics of such a strategy included layered missile defense at sea, preemptive ISR monitoring of launch sites, rapid retaliatory strike frameworks, and European naval coordination alongside U.S. military assets.

However, this architecture carries its escalation risk. A single successful Houthi strike on a high-value commercial vessel could trigger renewed U.S. or allied airstrikes inside Yemen, re-divert global shipping flows, and force insurers to re-rate the corridor. Thus, deterrence holds, but it is deterrence under tension, not deterrence under resolution.

Forecast: Strategic Scenarios for 2026

There are multiple scenarios that one could anticipate. However, the most likely scenario would be a triggered escalation where the current regional military action involving Israeli-Iranian confrontation or direct U.S.-Iran confrontation activates Houthi maritime operations. Critical indicators from the Houthis to watch for would include repositioning of coastal missile batteries, increased drone launch activity, and explicit linkage in Houthi statements between Yemen and external theaters.

Another scenario would be the Houthis’ internal consolidation and strategic freeze. Here, the Houthis prioritize internal governance and economic stabilization over external projection. In such a scenario, regardless of any U.S.-Iran military confrontation, the Houthis’ maritime attacks remain suspended, and Red Sea threats become rhetorical rather than operational. However, structural drivers, including ideology, alignment, and leverage utility, make such a scenario highly unlikely.

Structural Realities and Final Strategic Assessment

Three enduring factors ensure persistent volatility. Firstly, the geographic leverage is critical where the Bab el-Mandeb chokepoint, a narrow passage that connects the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden, is irreplaceable in global trade. Disruption has a disproportionate economic impact. Secondly, the asymmetric cost structure of the Red Sea maritime attacks grants the Houthis leverage, where their drones and missiles are low cost, the Western defensive interception and naval deployment that are much higher cost. Thirdly, attacks in the Red Sea generate global headlines, thus providing the Houthis with a political signaling value. That makes the theater attractive for indirect signaling. Thus, even if the current situation is relatively calm in the Red Sea, the underlying incentive structure for renewed maritime disruption persists, and threats continue to increase.

The current situation does not reflect the active Red Sea crisis levels of 2024-2025. However, it reflects something equally important: institutionalized readiness. The Houthis appear neither demobilized nor strategically exhausted. Defensive consolidation around Hodeidah, if confirmed, suggests the Houthis’ preparation for future confrontation, not abandonment of maritime leverage. The Red Sea will remain quiet only so long as broader regional dynamics remain contained. The moment those dynamics fracture, most notably with the U.S.-Iranian confrontation, the maritime corridor becomes the fastest and most globally visible arena for escalation. Accordingly, the conclusion is clear: the Red Sea is not stabilizing. It is waiting.

Dr. Mohamed ELDoh is a business development and consulting professional in the defense and security sector. Mohamed holds a Doctorate degree from Grenoble École de Management – France, an MBA from the EU Business School- Spain, and an Advanced Certificate in Counterterrorism Studies from the University of St Andrews, UK. He regularly authors articles addressing defense cooperation, counterterrorism, geopolitics, and emerging security threats in the Middle East and Africa. Views expressed in this article are the author’s own. 

Red Sea Uncertainty: A 2026 Forecast for the Houthis Actions was originally published on Global Security Review.

The recent helicopter accident, which claimed the lives of Iran’s president and foreign minister, is expected to have an adverse effect on the region soon. The incident is already drawing international attention, with many countries closely evaluating the potential implications for regional security. The incident also occurred in an already geopolitically tense context after a month of confrontation with Israel.

The death of Iran’s foreign minister, Amir Abdollahian, will complicate Iran’s foreign policy, international relations, and diplomatic engagements. Abdollahian was instrumental in critical negotiations, including the deal with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) that was brokered by China in February–March 2023 and indirect talks with the United States via Oman, regarding key topics related to regional escalation in the Middle East—including Yemen’s Houthi attacks as well as Iran’s nuclear developments. Anticipating the development of these discussions is crucial, as it is likely to impact Iran’s foreign policy and engagements.

The death of Iran’s president, Ibrahim Raissi, also poses a test for Iran’s internal stability and order. Middle East instability since October 7, 2023, makes this incident even more significant. Thus, how events in Iran unfold in the coming weeks have domestic and regional consequences, including the direction of Iran’s proxies in the region. Conspiracy theories are circulating in Iran as to who was responsible for the crash.

Even though Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, is the country’s actual ruler and the presidential position has limited authority, Raissi’s death thrusts Iran into an uncertain future. Experts believe that Raissi, 63, was preparing to succeed the 85-year-old supreme leader. They also believe that Raissi and Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba Khamenei, are potential successors to the supreme leader. This suggests that Mojtaba, known for his strong ties to Iran’s military and intelligence services, as well as to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), is a strong contender.

Iran’s constitution mandates the temporary assumption of the presidential role by Mohamed Mokhber, the first vice president, and the holding of elections within 50 days. Regardless of the timing and identity of Iran’s next president, the informally chosen successor to the supreme leader is likely to delay such elections. The unpredictability of the country’s overall course poses a significant risk and threat to the region, as there is a possibility that Iran may adopt a more assertive stance in response to recent events, thereby demonstrating its power to the international community. Of course, the actions of its proxies in the region and advancements in the nuclear program already signal this, which necessitates an anti-Iran alliance.

The absence of an anti-Iran alliance is perhaps explained by what political scientist Randall Schweller referred to as “under-balancing” or the inability or unwillingness of nations to form the kind of blocking alliances that the balance of power theory would predict. This also sheds light on why states facing threats fail to recognize present dangers and do not react or respond except in a minimal way.

Iran appears to be the winner of recent escalations. Maritime safety in the Red Sea is low because of Houthi militias. Iran is also the most influential player in Iraqi politics and controls Shiite militias. Iranian influence in Syria is one of the main reasons Syrian autocrat Bashar al-Assad remains in power. Furthermore, in Lebanon, Iran-controlled Hezbollah remains the dominant force in Lebanese politics and probably the main first line of defense for Iran in the region.

Iran’s continued support for militant groups across the Middle East amplify the urgency of an anti-Iran alliance. The Iranian regime already has a long history of providing financial, military, and logistical assistance to terrorist organizations. These groups not only undermine the sovereignty of their host countries, but they generate violence, chaos, and instability. For example, Houthi attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden over the past few months have significantly impacted maritime safety. In this regard, the US called on Iran to halt “unprecedented weapons” transfers to the Houthis, which enables the attacks. Iran’s history of provocations along the Strait of Hurmuz also poses a threat to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) nations if regional tensions continue to escalate. Iran’s drone diplomacy is also proving successful, with many of its attack drone capabilities playing a central role in different fights, including the Russia-Ukraine war and Yemen’s Houthi maritime attacks.

The regime’s expansionist agenda and support for proxy groups are already destabilizing the fragile balance of power in the Middle East. Iran’s involvement in conflicts in Iraq, Israel, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen fuel sectarian tensions and prolonged civilian suffering. However, Iran’s growing empowerment of proxy groups in these nations presents a serious threat to other neighboring nations, particularly the Arab countries that Iran views as US allies.

According to reports, Jordan successfully thwarted a suspected plot by Iran-backed militias to smuggle weapons from Syria into Jordan for sabotage purposes. On another front, Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen continued to launch attacks against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) until 2022. Even though China mediated a between Saudi Arabia and Iran in 2023, ongoing developments in the Middle East, fueled by the Gaza war and the actions of Iran’s proxy groups, are testing China’s influence in the region and the viability of the KSA-Iran deal. Although the Iran-backed Houthis warned, in a statement, that KSA would be a target if it supported the US-led strikes on their locations, the recent events, particularly the death of Iran’s president and foreign minister, will likely have an impact on the development of KSA-Iran relations.

Furthermore, Iran’s nuclear ambitions continue to present a serious threat to regional and global security. Despite international efforts to curtail its nuclear program over the past decade, Iran continues to expand its nuclear capabilities, raising concerns about the high possibility the regime will field nuclear weapons. Following his recent visit to Iran, Rafael Grossi, the director general of the United Nations Nuclear Agency, declared that Iran has never been closer to achieving a nuclear bomb, estimating a matter of weeks if Iran’s ruler decides to proceed in this direction.

Kamal Kharrazi, a senior advisor to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, said that Iran would have no choice but to modify its nuclear doctrine if Israel threatened its nuclear facilities or the regime’s very existence. However, it is safe to assume that Iran is using the narrative of Israel and the Gaza war, along with Arab sentiment, to advance its nuclear program.

Several key Arab states continued to encourage Washington to help manage Middle East security and contain Iran’s destabilizing activities on different fronts in order to prevent a broader regional war. Thus, it is expected that any anti-Iran alliance is led by the United States. KSA is already close to a deal on a bilateral defense pact with the US. The US and UAE also continue to work on advancing their bilateral defense relationship, and during the 34th US-Egypt Military Cooperation Committee (MCC), both sides agreed on the importance of advancing American-Egyptian military cooperation through joint training, exercises, and a strong desire to expand regional cooperation and security.

Arab nations clearly share Israel’s concerns and threat perception about Iran’s regional activities, particularly its growing influence through proxies. This serves as an area of dialogue, potentially reducing regional Arab tensions stemming from the ongoing Gaza war. Despite the perception of Iran as a threat, many Arab states remain reluctant to engage in direct confrontation with it. This is understandable since economic development projects fundamentally require regional peace. Regional peace, however, is not achieved without an anti-Iran alliance with a proper level of deterrence that is designed to at least halt, if not degrade, Iran’s activities and influence.

A Middle East Security Alliance (MESA), later dubbed by the media “Arab NATO,” was first announced during former US President Donald Trump’s visit to KSA in 2017. The announcement described MESA as an alliance that contributes to peace and security in the region and the world, encompassing all GCC states, Egypt, Jordan, and the US. Even though nothing has progressed in this proposal since then, ongoing developments in the Middle East do call for the need to revive such a proposal, with an emphasis on countering Iran.

By forming an anti-Iran alliance, countries in the region, in partnership with the US, can work together to address challenges as they emerge and anticipate different courses of action. Curbing the influence of Iran’s proxies and disrupting Iran’s support networks should remain a common and near-term goal for the international community.

Iran’s nuclear program also remains a core threat to the region and the world. A nuclear-armed Iran undoubtedly destabilizes the delicate balance of power in the region and heightens the risk of a catastrophic conflict with Israel as well as neighboring Arab states. Therefore, by forging an anti-Iran alliance, countries can coordinate efforts on multiple fronts to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons and avert a nuclear crisis in the Middle East.

Moreover, Iran’s aggressive foreign policy and expansionist activities exacerbate tensions in the region. Iran’s intervention in countries such as Iraq, Syria, and Yemen undermine efforts toward peace and reconciliation, underscoring the imperative need to establish an anti-Iran alliance. Only coordinated action can effectively mitigate the threats emanating from Iran, paving the way for a more peaceful Middle East.

Mohamed El Doh is a business development and consulting professional in the defense and security sector. Mohamed holds a doctorate degree from Grenoble École de Management, France, an MBA from the European Union Business School, Spain, and an Advanced Certificate in Counterterrorism Studies from the University of St Andrews, UK. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own.

The Middle East Needs an Anti-Iran Alliance was originally published on Global Security Review.

Previously known as the Turkic Council, the OTS was founded in 2009. Since then, it has grown into a fully-fledged international organization, to include several institutions—the General Secretariat in Istanbul, the Turkic Academy in Astana, the Turkic Cultural Foundation in Baku, as well as several other entities such as an OTS representative office in Budapest.

Engagement with the Central Asian Turkic states is strategically significant in Azerbaijan’s foreign policy. First and foremost, the ongoing geopolitical turmoil in the neighborhood leaves Azerbaijan as a vital link on a geographical route for Central Asian states, bypassing both Russia and China in their engagement with the external world. The issue of economic diversification, particularly in the form of the diversification of energy routes, makes Azerbaijan a strategic route for Kazakhstan to export its oil to Western and world markets without using the existing traditional route through Russia.

Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan’s state oil companies, KazMunaiGas and SOCAR, signed an agreement in March 2024 on a gradual increase in the transit of Kazakh oil via Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan expressed willingness to increase receipt of Kazakh oil to 2.2 million tons annually. The usage of Azerbaijani energy pipelines, in particular the Baku-Supsa and Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipelines, is a strategic necessity for Kazakhstan to export its oil to world markets. Oil shipment via Azerbaijan will gradually grow to 16.5 million barrels a year, double the 2023 figure.

Azerbaijan’s recent participation in Central Asian summits as well as the joint summits and meetings of Central Asian states and the Gulf countries (GCC) is also a new trend in its foreign policy and highlights the strategic importance of Baku for Turkic states. The areas of cooperation are huge and cover strategically important topics such as logistics, trade, energy routes, and economic and security aspects. Considering that the US, Germany, and United Kingdom (UK) increased their engagement with the Central Asian Turkic states since the Russia-Ukraine war, and that the US and Germany institutionalized their engagements in the format of 5+1, Azerbaijan’s strategic role for these countries is also growing.

With the restoration of Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity and sovereignty President Aliyev made integration with the Turkic states a national priority. Amidst the Russia-Ukraine war and the confrontations between the West and Russia and the US and China, Azerbaijan seeks to stay out of this global struggle and reduce its negative impacts in a region where security is already being affected.

The OTS has traditionally focused on culture, transportation, and logistics. President Aliyev proposed expanding OTS cooperation to include military, defense, and defense-industry matters, which reflects a proactive approach in Azerbaijan’s foreign policy in the midst of the increasing global and regional security issues.

Richard Outzen identifies five regional security dynamics that accelerate military integration and cooperation between the Turkic states. They are the economic and technological development in the Turkish defense industry, which is enabling Turkey to become one of the leading nations in the production and export of drones. Turkey’s military capacity, with a professional military that can provide training, education, doctrine, and military equipment to the countries that are seeking to diversify from Russia’s traditional dominance also matters. Russia’s aggressive foreign policy, which is seen in its support for Armenian irredentism against Azerbaijan, its war in Georgia (2008), and ongoing war against Ukraine, turned many away from Russia. Generational change in Turkic states, American withdrawal from Afghanistan (2021), and disagreements among the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) states are all factors shaping the view that no external power or military alliance can be a reliable security guarantor and that the Turkic states will have to step up joint security efforts to face security challenges.

According to Cavid Veliyev, following the liberation of Azerbaijani land from Armenian occupation, Azerbaijan became a target country for Western organizations, mainly driven by an orientalist and selective approach to the principle of territorial integrity and state sovereignty. As a result, Western institutions lost credibility in the eyes of Azerbaijani society. The OTS, however, emerged as a crucial ally of Azerbaijan. Its support for the restoration of Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity and sovereignty over the occupied lands has not gone unnoticed by the Azerbaijani public.

President Aliyev’s proposal to bolster defense and military cooperation among the member states builds on the Astana Declaration, approved by the heads of state at the 10th Summit of the Organization of Turkic States on November 3, 2023, which commits to joint efforts in fighting terrorism, drug trafficking, and separatism.

The Turkic states face many of the same security threats. Russia is an aggressive and unpredictable neighbor. The rise of an assertive Chinese foreign policy is worrisome. The Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan is problematic. American attempts to project its confrontation with China onto economic projects such as the Belt and Road Initiative in the region is also an issue of concern. Terrorism, particularly the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in neighboring Tajikistan worries Azerbaijan greatly. Finally, there is the issue of separatism.

The Turkic countries share a vision of joining efforts to face these collective security risks. They are represented in two different security organizations, with Turkey as a NATO member and Kazakhstan and the Kyrgyz Republic as members of the Russia-led CSTO. Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan are not members of either military bloc. Although Azerbaijan is a neutral country as a non-aligned movement member, it has strong relations with NATO and participates in NATO programs. It took part in the peacekeeping contingent in NATO missions in Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Baku also has close security ties with CSTO members such as Kazakhstan.

Additionally, Azerbaijan has a military alliance with Turkey, enhanced by the 2021 Shusha Declaration on Allied Relations between the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Republic of Turkey. The declaration highlights mutual security commitments, such as strengthening defense capability and military security, conducting joint Turkish-Azerbaijani military exercises and training, increasing the interaction and interoperability of the armed forces, increasing joint weapons production, and holding joint meetings of the security councils on national security issues.

If the territorial integrity and sovereignty of either state is violated, the parties will hold joint consultations and coordinate their political, diplomatic, and military efforts to eliminate the threat. With the recent change in the landscape in the South Caucasus region, the Shusha Declaration is the embodiment of the emerging Azerbaijani-Turkish cooperation as the decisive military-economic factor shaping regional developments and the security architecture.

The OTS covers a vast geography with substantial natural and human resources. It has close to 170 million inhabitants with the potential for this number to increase to 250 million by 2050, and the potential to produce $2 trillion in gross domestic product. The significance of the Turkic states increased following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as Europe’s trade routes with China passing via Russian territory become insecure geopolitically.

Its concrete projects include the establishment of an investment fund, integration and ease of customs procedures, and the promotion of the Middle Corridor between Europe and China via the South Caucasus and Central Asia, also known as the Trans Caspian trade route. There are increasing investments that ensure intra-regional connectivity with well-developed infrastructure projects among the member states.

In short, Azerbaijan, which is often overlooked by Western states, is a country actively working to place itself as a key partner to the West, while recognizing that it sits between Russia and China—an unenviable position. Supporting Azerbaijani efforts to improve its economic success and security efforts will only make the country a more reliable partner for NATO and the United States.

Rufat Ahmadzada is a graduate of City, University of London. His research area covers the South Caucasus and Iran. 

Analyzing the Turkic Vector of Azerbaijan’s Foreign Policy was originally published on Global Security Review.