Comment by Riaz Haq on July 22, 2026 at 9:37am

Joseph Torigian
@JosephTorigian
The great
@asfandyarmir
has a new
@ForeignAffairs
piece: Pakistan Won the War in Iran: Islamabad and the New Path to Global Power

https://x.com/JosephTorigian/status/2079223715456323908?s=20

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Pakistan Won the War in Iran
Islamabad and the New Path to Global Power

Asfandyar Mir

July 20, 2026

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/pakistan/pakistan-won-war-iran

On April 7, as the deadline approached for U.S. President Donald Trump’s ultimatum to the Iranian government to open the Strait of Hormuz or face the destruction of “a whole civilization,” a Pakistani general placed a phone call that helped avert disaster. Field Marshal Asim Munir—the chief of Pakistan’s army, the country’s most powerful institution—pressed Trump and Iran’s surviving leadership to stop the war. Within hours, Washington and Tehran announced a cease-fire. Trump and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi publicly thanked Munir and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif. Days later, U.S. Vice President JD Vance sat across from Iranian negotiators in Islamabad for more than 20 hours, the highest-level direct contact between the two countries since the 1979 revolution.

The future of the resulting cease-fire, and the formal truce and plans for a broader settlement that followed, is now deeply uncertain. But Pakistan’s mediation was nevertheless a remarkable development. For most of the postwar era, the attributes that made countries geopolitically influential were settled: they included major-power status, economic weight, liberal normative credentials, and convening authority over other major states. At no point during its history did Pakistan meet these criteria. It was a nuclear-armed country on the fringes of the Western order, associated more often with regional instability than with conflict resolution, with a limited economy and few liberal democratic bona fides. And yet, during the most dangerous Middle East crisis in a generation, Pakistan did what China, France, Germany, India, the United Kingdom, and other geopolitical heavyweights could not.

Islamabad’s efforts are emblematic of a broader shift in global politics. A disordered international system shaped by multipolar competition is starting to reward different kinds of states that lack traditional geopolitical credentials. With the United Nations and other multilateral bodies proving unable to mitigate modern conflicts, nontraditional powers, including Pakistan, Qatar, Turkey, and others, are beginning to fill the gaps by engaging in order-stabilizing statecraft. The ability of these states to foster trust across geopolitical blocs and open channels of communication between adversaries who cannot or choose not to engage has allowed them to mediate hostage and prisoner releases, negotiate the opening of commercial corridors, and open meaningful political dialogue, all in service of managing conflicts before they spiral out of control. In the coming decade, this type of statecraft will make them invaluable geopolitical assets.

Not all of these states will pass the litmus tests the United States typically uses to sort partners, such as democratic credentials, liberal governance, or political distance from China. Washington may believe that it should rely only on established allies and partners who share its values and strategic objectives in its competition with Beijing. But if the United States wants to keep itself out of costly conflicts around the world, it may have no choice but to forge closer ties with the new stabilizing powers.

Comment by Riaz Haq on July 27, 2026 at 4:05pm

Pakistan’s Great Game

By Christophe Jaffrelot


https://www.institutmontaigne.org/en/expressions/pakistans-great-ga...




[3/3] Are my friends’ enemies my enemies? Not for Pakistan, which is capitalizing on its good relations with China and the United States. How should we interpret the recent rapprochement between Washington and Islamabad? What role does China play? The final installment of an analysis of Pakistan’s new foreign policy, by Christophe Jaffrelot.


The third level of analysis on which Pakistan’s strategy is based extends beyond the Middle East-even though it is centered there-as it concerns the relationships Islamabad is striving to maintain with the United States and China. While Islamabad has already appeared to be walking a tightrope between Iran and Saudi Arabia, its desire to maintain relations with both the United States and China seems even more of a balancing act. Yet this approach is part of a long-standing tradition.
The relationship between Pakistan and China is not the same as the one between Pakistan and the United States. China has, in fact, become and remained "an all weather friend" decade after decade since the 1950s.
Certainly, the relationship between Pakistan and China is not the same as the one between Pakistan and the United States. China has, in fact, become and remained "an all weather friend" decade after decade since the 1950s, without the two countries ever approaching a breaking point that would force them to rebuild ties afterward. In other words, it is a strategic relationship that is fueled by their hostility toward a common enemy, that is India. Pakistan-as we have seen-finds in China the ally that allows it to stand up to India (all the more so since Beijing helped it acquire the nuclear bomb), while China, by supporting Pakistan, has succeeded in pinning India down on its western border, guaranteeing itself free rein in Asia.

In the crisis stemming from the Iran War, Pakistan and China remain partners. The former, as is often the case, takes some of its orders from Beijing, while the latter uses the Pakistanis-and their effective diplomats with Washington’s ear-to hasten the end of hostilities. Even more so than other Asian countries, China is indeed paying a very high price for this war, which has caused its energy costs to skyrocket and is weakening an economy already shaken, among other things, by the rise of protectionism. That Pakistan has repeatedly "reported to Beijing" during the war is clearly evident from Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar’s trips to the Chinese capital in late March and again from May 19 to 21. Five days later, it was Prime Minister Shabaz Sharif’s turn to visit Beijing, where he was congratulated by Xi for Pakistan’s mediation efforts. In fact, the head of the Pakistani military, Asim Munir, was in Tehran at the same time!
While Pakistan’s relationship with China is rooted in strategic logic, its relationship with the United States is more tactical in nature.
While Pakistan’s relationship with China is rooted in strategic logic, its relationship with the United States is more tactical in nature-and has been since the 1950s, when General Ayub Khan boasted of his ability to play "one lion against another" (referring to the United States and the USSR at the start of the Cold War). In its dealings with the United States, Pakistan has played the role of intermediary, or even "client," within a typical clientelist framework: in exchange for the services Islamabad provided to Washington, the United States provided Pakistan with substantial aid and agreed to sell it sophisticated weapons, and even to train its officers-a privilege greatly appreciated.

Comment by Riaz Haq on July 27, 2026 at 4:06pm

Pakistan’s Great Game

By Christophe Jaffrelot


https://www.institutmontaigne.org/en/expressions/pakistans-great-ga...



The first major service rendered by the Pakistanis to the Americans was none other than the intermediary role played by General Yahya Khan vis-à-vis Chairman Mao in the early 1970s, which led to the United States’ recognition of the People’s Republic of China. Over the following decade, Pakistan served as an intermediary between Washington and the mujahideen tasked with driving the Soviets out of Afghanistan. And in the 2000s, Pakistan was tasked by Washington with hunting down al-Qaeda-with much more mixed success this time, as evidenced by the discovery of bin Laden’s hideout in Abbottabad in 2011.
Whenever the United States no longer needed Pakistan-or even felt betrayed by it-it abandoned the country or even imposed sanctions on it.
Moreover, relations between the two countries had grown much more strained since then, following a classic pattern: whenever the United States no longer needed Pakistan-or even felt betrayed by it-it abandoned the country or even imposed sanctions on it. In 2017, Donald Trump decided to drastically cut the aid Pakistan received in connection with U.S. military operations in Afghanistan, to which Pakistan was supposed to contribute-something Trump was not convinced of.


Trump 2, reversing the mistrust he had felt toward Pakistan in 2017, instead bet on that country even before the war with Iran. This reversal can be explained by a diverse set of factors. As early as the beginning of 2025, the White House set its sights on Pakistan to serve as a regional security guarantor capable of combating Islamism in its area (particularly against the Taliban). In exchange, Pakistan was able to place orders for U.S. weapons that had previously been off-limits to it-much to the displeasure of New Delhi.

The blitzkrieg between India and Pakistan in the spring of 2025 dramatically accelerated the U.S.-Pakistan rapprochement. While New Delhi refused to acknowledge any role for the United States in the cessation of hostilities, Islamabad thanked Donald Trump for intervening to prevent an escalation (which Trump viewed as posing a nuclear risk). The U.S. president appreciated Pakistan’s attitude all the more because, in the wake of the conflict, Pakistan nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize.


These goodwill gestures were accompanied by economic deals involving rare earth minerals-to which Pakistan agreed to grant the Americans access (particularly in Balochistan)-and cryptocurrencies. World Liberty Financial, the company owned by one of Trump’s sons and Zach Witkoff-the son of Special Envoy Steve Witkoff-signed an agreement with Pakistan in January 2026 to integrate the country’s payment system.

On the international stage, Pakistan also stepped up when Trump established a "Peace Council" for Gaza; its inauguration highlighted the close ties between President Trump, Marshal Munir, head of Pakistani intelligence, and Prime Minister Sharif. It was therefore only natural that Pakistan found itself in the role of mediator between the United States and Iran beginning in March 2026. On April 8, the country emerged as the facilitator that had made the conclusion of a ceasefire possible, and on April 11 and 12, Islamabad hosted the Iranian and American delegations, once again rendering effectively possible a dialogue-albeit indirect-that had been severed since 1979.


Pakistan’s role as a "good offices" mediator was praised by a large number of political leaders, including European ones. Last June, Kaja Kallas, the EU Vice President in charge of the Union’s international relations, on the occasion of the 8th Strategic Dialogue between Pakistan and the European Union in Islamabad, thanked Pakistan-"a major regional power"-for its efforts in helping to avert an "all-out war" in the Middle East.

Comment by Riaz Haq on July 27, 2026 at 4:07pm

Pakistan’s Great Game

By Christophe Jaffrelot

https://www.institutmontaigne.org/en/expressions/pakistans-great-ga...

Conclusion: A Temporary Return to Favor or a Structural Turning Point?
History has accustomed us to seeing Pakistan return to the forefront of the international stage in a more or less fleeting manner. In 1980, General Zia, who had been universally despised following the 1977 coup, suddenly became acceptable again following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. In 2001, General Musharraf, who had also been a pariah since his forceful seizure of power in 1999, experienced the same windfall following the September 11 attacks. In 2026, Pakistan appears useful once again, no longer to wage war against the USSR or terrorism, but to make peace. This puts it back in the role of mediator that it has also filled in the past between the United States and China.
In 2026, Pakistan appears useful once again, no longer to wage war against the USSR or terrorism, but to make peace.
Each time, these glorious episodes were very short-lived and came to an end due to criticism of the Pakistani regime’s authoritarianism - with the military always remaining in power, even when civilians are in the forefront; its ties to Islamists accused of terrorist activities - particularly in India; or accusations of nuclear proliferation. Will the same be true tomorrow, once the war in Iran is over and the United States no longer needs Pakistan?

Everything will, of course, depend on the outcome of the conflict and the role Pakistan plays in resolving it-for it will be harder to send Islamabad back home if the world owes it something resembling peace.

India’s ability to isolate Pakistan-the strategy Narendra Modi has pursued for more than a decade-is another important variable, though its significance may be undermined by New Delhi’s drift toward authoritarianism and ethnocracy, as well as by the economic and social crisis threatening the country.

A more significant factor entering the equation relates to regional balances of power: Pakistan will continue to serve as a "net security provider" for Middle Eastern countries such as Saudi Arabia if those countries continue to fear the rise of Israel - a potential regional hegemon - and if they doubt Washington’s intentions, or even its mere reliability. There is no doubt that Pakistan itself will do everything in its power to prevent Israel from asserting itself on the regional stage and to gain influence over Iran-which is what the Israeli-American plan for regime change in Iran might have entailed. At the very least, faced with the risk of Israeli hegemony based on force and repeated military interventions, Pakistan could emerge as the architect of a resistance front bringing together not only Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt, but also Iran.

Alongside these hypothetical scenarios, one thing is certain: Pakistan has reached a turning point through the recognition of its military capabilities, as reflected in the mutual defense agreement it signed with Saudi Arabia. This point of no return is largely due to the close ties it has forged with China, to which Pakistan owes a significant portion of its strike capability. While the relationship between Pakistan and the United States remains subject to uncertainty due to its tactical nature, the relationship between Pakistan and China is strategic in nature. Since Iran is an important partner of China, in the short term, Pakistan will be all the more inclined to resist attempts to destabilize its neighbor-which it has feared from the very first day of the war anyway. While Islamabad welcomes Iran’s weakening and the setback to its nuclear program, maintaining the current regime is the lesser of two evils (especially since Tehran no longer trusts New Delhi as much as it once did).

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