Every administration since President Barack Obama’s first term has promised to look back on the Middle East. Under Obama and later President Joe Biden, that meant the Indo-Pacific; under President Donald Trump, it means bringing America home—the Western Hemisphere first and the Indo-Pacific second. Each was driven back by a conflict that could not be avoided.
The Iran War of 2026 suggested a different outcome. The Gulf states, along with Turkey and Pakistan, showed that they could shoulder the diplomatic burden of managing Iran themselves, and part of the security burden, too, provided Washington would be the guarantor of the final decision, not the manager of first choice. That difference is what would allow Washington’s true priorities to survive the next crisis rather than be hindered by it.
Every administration since President Barack Obama’s first term has promised to look back on the Middle East. Under Obama and later President Joe Biden, that meant the Indo-Pacific; under President Donald Trump, it means bringing America home—the Western Hemisphere first and the Indo-Pacific second. Each was driven back by a conflict that could not be avoided.
The Iran War of 2026 suggested a different outcome. The Gulf states, along with Turkey and Pakistan, showed that they could shoulder the diplomatic burden of managing Iran themselves, and part of the security burden, too, provided Washington would be the guarantor of the final decision, not the manager of first choice. That difference is what would allow Washington’s true priorities to survive the next crisis rather than be hindered by it.
The war produced a division of labor. Doha, Riyadh, and Islamabad engaged in diplomacy with Tehran that no American administration could do with credibility. Pakistan, bound to Saudi Arabia by a defense pact signed five months earlier, provides a common ground that allows Riyadh to treat its blockade as a regional exercise. Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia have formed a coalition to manage Hormuz without US ownership. All that remains for Washington is to prevent an existing strike, keep naval power available, and sell weapons that make deterrence credible.
Look back to 2015 for contrast. In May, when the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) was in the spotlight, many Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) rulers jump Obama’s Camp David summit and sending deputies instead, which was read by many as a repudiation of the nuclear deal that Washington handed over to them instead of creating with them. In May 2026, Trump said held far for a new strike because Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates asked him to give more space to negotiations. This marked the moment when the Gulf arrived as an independent player. When war threatened to break out, the Gulf, Turkey and Pakistan built rampages that helped Trump end it.
The Gulf states no longer need Washington to mediate with Tehran. Saudi Arabia opened his channel in 2023, after a decade of US-led diplomacy that closed. Riyadh and Abu Dhabi never performed very well in enrichment percentages. Their complaint: The JCPOA solved one problem that Washington cares about, while ignoring Iran’s missiles, representatives of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and the blocking of sanctions aimed at Hizbullah and the Houthis. When Biden revived the same song behind closed doors in 2021, the Gulf was informed rather than consulted, directing Riyadh to Beijing to proxy instead.
China’s mediation did not stop Iran from targeting Saudi Arabia when the war broke out in February as Tehran’s missiles and drones hit Saudi Arabian pipelines and air bases. What it bought was direct access to Tehran to begin the difficult task of slowing down. Reports described Qatar offering to restricting its gas output if Iran avoided the Ras Laffan buildings, along with the UAE releasing billions in frozen Iranian assets in exchange for being left alone. Both governments denied it, but the possibility of either suggests that GCC capitals are cutting deals with Tehran.
The economic stakes add urgency. Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 and comparable national strategies rely on the Gulf for capital and tourism as it tries to diversify away from oil revenues. That model requires regional stability, which Iran’s missiles and drones put at risk, and which is why ending the war became a priority for Gulf governments. A Gulf that can manage Iran on its own terms requires less oversight from Washington, which is a prerequisite for any US pivot elsewhere.
None of this adds up to a regular Gulf position. The UAE is demanding compensation from Iran for the damage it caused to its critical infrastructure, and its dispute with Riyadh over oil policy grew fierce enough that Abu Dhabi pulled out of OPEC in the middle of the crisis. Qatar and Oman argued for talks with Iran throughout the conflict. Saudi Arabia dismissed Iranian diplomats in March after repeated strikes, while keeping open its 2023 channel and supporting Pakistan’s mediation to end the war. The GCC has never had a unified Iran policy, but collectively it delivered something that no single player could manage alone.
The only place where the Gulf states have taken a stand is against Trump’s attempt to take the political crown from the issue. He has ever to be pressed Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Pakistan, and Turkey joined the Abraham Accords as a price for ending the war that they did more than he ended. Riyadh’s response has been unequivocal: there is no normalcy with Israel without genuine movement towards Palestinian statehood. Islamabad’s was blunt, calling the idea inconsistent with its own principles.
These same reforms may extend to Israel. A Washington genuinely freed from control of the Middle East crisis will not prefer to underwrite endless military options on Israel’s behalf. Without that notion of unconditional support, Tel Aviv has more reason to regard a diplomatic solution with the Palestinians as a safer path to security than force that has not solved the problem.
The integration of Iran into this system, a Tehran that trades and negotiates instead of threatening through allies and missiles, is the result that a sustainable Gulf system needs for a long time. An Iran with a stake in regional stability costs less to maintain than an isolated Iran that looks to make that isolation more costly. But the interests of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Turkey, and Pakistan diverge enough that cooperation will have a ceiling.
Riyadh can live with an Iran that talks to it directly instead of through Washington, backed by a lot of US equipment and a Pakistani defense pact. The same logic applies to Abu Dhabi, only more forcefully. The UAE has two major security partners, Washington and, since the Abraham Accords, Israel, but neither has been able to fully insulate it from its much larger neighbor sitting across the narrow strait. The UAE absorbed more missiles and drones during the war than any other country including Israel. The revelations, more than diplomacy, pushed Abu Dhabi towards a more passive rather than a more escalating end to the war. The UAE also has greater economic benefits from cooperation with Iran, given its decades-long trade relationship with Dubai as a financial hub for Iran-linked businesses, so a genuine desire for economic cooperation with Tehran is coupled with continued mistrust of it on security grounds.
Turkey cares less about economic cooperation with Iran than about Iran’s influence in Syria and Iraq, where the two have long supported opposing sides. Ankara’s ambition is to be a co-architect of the new order, not to welcome a Shiite rival into it. Pakistan’s borders are more structural. Islamabad shares a long and often violent border with Iran through Balochistan on one side and reserve India on the other. It is also tied to Saudi Arabia by a defense pact that partly acts as a hedge against Iran, a commitment that leaves Pakistan unable to defend Iran’s full cooperation without making itself less valuable to its wealthy patrons in the Gulf.
These interests together define an order that is exploiting Iran economically while keeping it at a military height. That ceiling is what makes the small US role so attractive. Yet the military that carries this burden still relies on American parts, weapons and training to continue operating. Washington may be afraid to be the guarantor of the final decision because Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Turkey, and Pakistan have each committed independently and jointly to the possibility of Iran’s re-entry without allowing it to dominate the region. It just requires them to continue to manage Iran themselves, which the war showed they are willing to do.
A regional order that gives Tehran a seat at the table in terms of controlling its neighbors is winning trust in a guarantor that started a war it could not end and holds the Gulf with the bill. The hostility between Tehran and Washington is 47 years old, and the blockade, sanctions, and back roads have never cleared. The war may have forced the region to build something else. Whether it can do so sustainably will determine whether Washington ever gets the homecoming it keeps promising itself.
