Article 5, Now Sold Separately

When Pakistan and Saudi Arabia signed a mutual defense pact in September 2025, the language was unmistakable.

The world has seen that we neither bow to aggression nor compromise on national honour. — Rana Sanaullah

It was NATO's Article 5, verbatim, transplanted to a bilateral agreement between two non-NATO states. Eight months later, Norway's prime minister Jonas Gahr Støre stood beside French president Emmanuel Macron and announced that Norway — a NATO founding member — would join France's nuclear deterrence umbrella.

Along with nine other European countries, Norway will participate in your initiative on how French nuclear weapons can contribute to security and deterrence in Europe. — Jonas Gahr Støre

Two continents, one move: copying the mutual-defense obligation out of NATO while keeping the American relationship intact. This is not defection. It is duplication. The pattern is now visible across three continents. In Europe, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany signed backup defense treaties in September 2025. The purpose was explicit.

He’s not leading. If you’re leading, you got to have other people following you, and he’s pushing people away. He treats our allies as if they’re adversaries. — Gregory Meeks

In the Pacific, Australia signed the Pukpuk mutual defense treaty with Papua New Guinea in October 2025. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was direct about what it was.

This treaty contains a mutual defense obligation similar to Australia’s ANZUS Treaty commitments, where we declare that in the event of an armed attack on either of our countries, we would both act to meet the common danger. — Anthony Albanese

Australia's first new formal alliance since 1951 was a photocopy of its US treaty, filed separately. In the Gulf, the architecture is more elaborate. Saudi Arabia and Pakistan built their bilateral pact first, then spent ten months negotiating Turkey's entry ^[1]. The result, signed in Mecca on August 7, is a trilateral mutual-defense obligation that combines Saudi financing, Turkish NATO-standard forces, and Pakistan's nuclear deterrent ^[2]. Pakistan activated the pact in April 2026, deploying 8,000 to 13,000 soldiers, sixteen JF-17 fighter jets, two drone squadrons, and a Chinese HQ-9 air defense system to Saudi Arabia's King Abdulaziz Air Base after Iranian strikes ^[3]. The pact is operational, not declarative. For the Gulf states, the driver was not only Trump's rhetoric but the lived experience of the US-Iran war. When Saudi Arabia blocked American military access to its airspace and Prince Sultan Airbase during the Iran crisis, it turned instead to Pakistan — its pact partner — to mediate with Tehran ^[4]. The parallel defense structure provided a diplomatic channel the US relationship could not. Riyadh got something from its new pact that Washington could not or would not give it. The common driver across all three continents is the same. Donald Trump has spent 2026 making America's security commitments explicitly conditional. At the Ankara NATO summit in July, he called the alliance a "paper tiger."

I’m very angry with NATO — Donald Trump

In February, Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Elbridge Colby delivered the message plainly.

If Europe rises to this moment, if it truly embraces primary responsibility for its own defense, then the alliance will emerge stronger, more resilient, and better prepared for the challenges ahead. — Elbridge A. Colby

NATO allies reported a "sharp decline in trust" toward the United States, driven by "political rhetoric that explicitly questions Article 5," and began "preparing for a strategic future where American security engagements are selective and contingent rather than guaranteed" ^[5]. The hegemon is creating the gap, and allies are filling it. What is striking is not that allies are hedging. It is that Washington is letting them. In October 2025, the US and Saudi Arabia conducted joint airstrikes in Iraq — even as Riyadh was negotiating Turkey's entry into the defense pact it had signed with Pakistan the month before ^[6]. In November, Trump designated Saudi Arabia a "major non-NATO ally" and approved the sale of 48 F-35 jets, while those trilateral negotiations continued ^[7]. At the Ankara summit where Trump called NATO a paper tiger, he simultaneously lifted CAATSA sanctions on Turkey and opened the door to restoring Ankara's access to the F-35 program — the very summit where Turkey was finalizing its entry into the Mecca mutual-defense pact ^[8]. The US is not being bypassed against its will. It is deepening military ties with the same states that are building parallel defense obligations outside its control. The logic is cold but clear: forcing allies to choose risks them not choosing Washington. Accommodation preserves the US relationship as the primary layer, even as allies add insurance policies on top. The contrast case sharpens the point. On August 7 — the same day the Mecca pact was signed — Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea formalized a strategic alliance explicitly "rooted in shared hostility toward United States power" ^[9]. That is a bloc. It is exclusive, anti-Western, and demands a break with the American system. The a-la-carte model is the opposite: every state keeps its US tie and adds its own Article 5 insurance on top. One model breaks with Washington; the other duplicates around it. Pakistan is the proof. It is simultaneously deploying troops to defend Saudi Arabia against Iran under the Mecca pact, mediating between the United States and Iran, and signing trade and security pacts with Tehran in July 2026 ^[3][10]. Its deputy prime minister called the Saudi defense agreement a "sovereign agreement" — deliberately positioning it outside any alliance framework, as a direct state-to-state obligation ^[11]. This is multi-alignment in practice, not bloc commitment. Pakistan is not choosing between Washington and Riyadh, or between Washington and Tehran. It is choosing all of them. The result is a global security order that fits no existing category. It is not a return to Cold War blocs — the Russia-China-Iran-North Korea axis is the exception, not the rule. It is not non-alignment — every state in the pattern remains deeply tied to the United States. It is a-la-carte security: each state keeps its American relationship and adds its own Article 5 insurance on top, and Washington lets it happen because the alternative is worse. The hegemon is building the gap its allies fill, and then selling them the weapons to fill it.