Daily Times

The ‘raging bull’ of the Middle East is reportedly all set to swap his horns for the crown. Whether or not this happens sooner rather than later hardly matters. For Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman is the heir apparent and has been groomed for the top spot by his father. Moreover, regional unrest, which is said to be largely of MBS’s own doing, necessitates that he finish what he has started. And, of course, the very real fear is that he won’t be happy until Iran is annihilated.

So what does all this mean for Pakistan?

The answer is, quite a lot. And not much of it good.

We, here in Pakistan, are well aware that the Middle East in burning. Thus far, we have succeeded in walking the tightrope of neutrality between the Saudis and the Iranians in their battle for regional dominance. Indeed, we have gone out of our way to reassure Tehran that the Islamic Military Alliance is not an anti-Shia bloc with the latter in its sights. And then at the beginning of this month, Gen Bajwa visited Iran; the first time that a Pakistan Army chief had made such a trip in two decades.

But now it seems that we are about to lose our balance and there may be no trampoline to cushion our fall. And it is not the Saudis who have unwittingly pushed us close the proverbial abyss. But our all-weather friend, China.

For in a break with tradition, Beijing has entered the Middle Eastern free-for-all. It has assured King Salman that it remains steadfastly behind the Kingdom, regardless of regional upheavals. Which may or may not be another way of saying that it will oppose Iranian manoeuvrings. The timing of the Chinese support is significant, coming as it does just when the Saudi petro-dollar bubble is said to be readying to burst. This suggests that when Trump met Xi recently — the two men talked about more than just “great chemistry”.

The Israelis also going on record as saying they are willing to share with Riyadh all necessary intelligence pertaining to what they term Iranian plans to control the Middle East isn’t helping us either. Meaning that Tehran may well view our strategic alliance with China as translating into support for Tel Aviv’s plans to see it come undone. If the worst were to happen, Pakistan could well expect Iran to deliver on its warning of decimating the terrorist safe-havens on our side of the border that it says we are allowing to be used to launch attacks into its territory. This could ultimately see us under real fire from both Tehran and Washington. With the real risk of Pakistani soil becoming the latest battleground in someone else’s proxy war. The only hope is that Beijing wouldn’t allow this, given that its economic interest are dependent upon a secure and stable Pakistan; and if this means bringing in its own troops, it wouldn’t want them caught up in any crossfire. In addition, the Saudis would also likely want to keep any Middle Eastern spill-over away from our borders, if for no other reason than Lebanon and Syria represent the preferred theatres from which to take on Hezbollah.

We trust that the Pakistani civil-military leadership was apprised of the surprise Chinese announcement beforehand. Just as we trust that the former reminded Beijing that it needs us for CPEC to work.  *

Published in Daily Times, November 18^th 2017.