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Turkey signals readiness to help Saudi Arabia counter Houthi attacks
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said on Saturday that Saudi Arabia may have military needs due to the ongoing attacks by Yemen’s Houthis and that Turkey was ready to help under a trilateral defence pact that also includes Pakistan.
“We see there are very serious attacks on Saudi Arabia’s territorial integrity, sovereignty. We have an alliance agreement in our pact. We are in serious solidarity on this point… They may have some military needs, especially on some technical issues. We would have no issues in meeting these,” Fidan told broadcaster NTV.
The joint defence agreement, dubbed the “Mecca Joint Defence Agreement”, signed last month stipulates that an armed attack on any one of the three countries will be regarded as an attack on all of them.
The Houthis, who control the most populous parts of Yemen, have been launching attacks on Saudi Arabia since declaring a naval blockade against Riyadh in July, a new front in the wider war that began with US and Israeli strikes on Iran in late February. The attacks have targeted Saudi cities, energy infrastructure and shipping, threatening global oil supplies and the main alternative Red Sea route for Gulf exports while traffic through the Strait of Hormuz remains disrupted.
Turkey is moving closer to directly helping Saudi Arabia defend itself against the Islamic Republic-backed Houthis, creating a potentially dangerous new confrontation between Ankara and Tehran.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said today that Saudi Arabia may require military support, particularly technical assistance, because of Houthi attacks and that Turkey would have no problem providing it under the Saudi-Turkey-Pakistan Mecca Alliance.
He also revealed the alliance is rapidly becoming operational. Its institutional structure is nearly complete, with personnel deployment and establishment of a military headquarters among the remaining steps. Fidan called it an “equation-changing” platform.
At the same time, Turkey is drawing a very deliberate line: Saudi Arabia does not want to enter the United States-Iran war, and Ankara considers attempts to drag it into that conflict unacceptable.
That creates a serious problem for the Islamic Republic.
Its Houthi allies are attacking Saudi territory while Turkey and Pakistan have signed a collective-defence agreement with the kingdom. The more the Houthis escalate, the more they risk turning that agreement from paper into an actual military structure supporting Saudi Arabia.
The Islamic Republic built its proxy network to surround its adversaries. Its remaining proxies may now be helping build a regional military architecture designed to contain them.