In July 2024, three presidents gathered in Astana for their first trilateral summit. The leaders were Azerbaijan’s Ilham Aliyev, Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and Pakistan’s Shahbaz Sharif. It wasn’t just another diplomatic photo opportunity. This was the formal elevation of what intelligence analysts now recognize as a highly effective military partnership. This was outside traditional alliance structures. In May 2025, missiles flew between India and Pakistan. Among over 50 Muslim nations, only Turkey and Azerbaijan openly backed Pakistan. When Armenian forces faced Azerbaijani drones in 2020, Pakistani soldiers were reportedly fighting alongside Turkish advisors in Nagorno-Karabakh.

This isn’t sentiment. It’s strategy disguised as solidarity.

When Flags Become Weapons: The Psychology of Proxy Brotherhood

Pakistani vloggers visited Azerbaijan during the 2020 war. They found Pakistani and Turkish flags hanging from Azerbaijani buildings. These flags were not government mandates but genuine popular enthusiasm. This emotional resonance provides perfect cover for what is fundamentally a transactional relationship. Each nation projects its conflicts onto the others’ struggles. This creates a psychological multiplier effect. It transforms bilateral disputes into trilateral causes.

The institutionalization of this brotherhood is now concrete and measurable. The “Three Brothers — 2021” exercises marked the first-ever joint military drills between the three countries. They were held in Baku with 8-day special forces training. This training was designed to “prepare for operations in peacetime and wartime”. By 2023, Azerbaijan and Turkey were conducting joint exercises named after Mustafa Kemal Ataturk involving up to 3,000 military personnel.

Turkey’s contribution to Azerbaijan’s 2020 victory wasn’t just the drones. It was three decades of methodical army-building. This started after the Soviet collapse. Similarly, Pakistan’s military cooperation with Turkey dates to the 1970s. During this time, Ankara openly supported Pakistan’s Kashmir position. Ankara also maintained military support during its wars with India. What appears as spontaneous brotherhood is actually institutionalized mutual dependence.

The genius lies in the optics. When Turkey provides military training or Pakistan sends advisors, it’s framed as “brotherly assistance” rather than strategic intervention. Turkey’s Erdoğan invokes the phrase “one nation, two states” with Azerbaijan, while Pakistan and Turkey are exploring dual nationality initiatives. Identity politics becomes the perfect camouflage for geopolitical maneuvering.

The Arsenal of Convenience: How Shared Enemies Create Shared Arsenals

Each nation’s primary adversary conveniently validates the others’ strategic choices. Pakistan refuses to recognize Armenia as a sovereign state. Turkey and Azerbaijan support Pakistan on Kashmir. This brings opposition from India. For Baku, Islamabad and Ankara have supported efforts to liberate formerly occupied territories. In Pakistan’s case, the Turkish and Azerbaijani governments have supported Islamabad in the conflict over Jammu and Kashmir.

This creates a fascinating strategic symbiosis. During 2020 to 2024, 10% of Turkey’s total arms shipments went to Pakistan. This included Bayraktar TB2 drones. These drones rose to global prominence following their combat success in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War. Turkey has invited Pakistan to join their 5th generation TF-X fighter jet programme. Meanwhile, there is a strong likelihood of Islamabad selling Pakistani and Chinese-designed JF-17 fighter jets to Azerbaijan.

The war-tested technology flows seamlessly between conflicts. The same Turkish drones devastated Armenian positions in Karabakh. These drones were providing deadly capabilities to Pakistan in its conflict with India. Turkish military advisors and Syrian mercenaries who gained experience in Libya and Syria were reportedly active in Nagorno-Karabakh. This creates an accelerated learning curve—each war becomes a testing ground for the next.

The Economic Logic Behind Military Sentiment

Strip away the rhetoric about historical bonds, and a clear economic pattern emerges. Azerbaijan’s military expenditures are around 4 billion dollars, creating a massive market for defense procurement. The two countries plan to establish a joint investment portfolio. This portfolio has an estimated value of $2 billion and will finance joint business projects. The High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council targets elevating bilateral trade to $5 billion by 2023.

Turkey is building 17,000 tonne Fleet Tankers, PN-MILGEM corvettes, and upgrading Agosta 90B submarines for Pakistan. The Middle Corridor initiative is crucial for enhancing trade routes. It boosts economic integration across the region. The corridor passes through Azerbaijan and Turkey. Pakistan’s participation was discussed at their trilateral summit.

The Technology Transfer Pipeline

The arms flow creates a sophisticated learning ecosystem. Turkish Aerospace Industries signed contracts with Pakistan’s National Engineering and Science Commission. They will jointly produce Anka military drones. The technology will be transferred between the companies. Pakistan’s Air Force reportedly trains Turkish pilots. Pakistani pilots have allegedly been flying Turkish F-16s in operations against Greece. This creates “mercenary pilot” arrangements that blur traditional sovereignty lines.

War, in this context, becomes a market opportunity. In the five years before the second Karabakh war, about 70 percent of Azerbaijan’s arms imports came from Israel. However, the trilateral partnership is rapidly changing these procurement patterns. Each conflict validates the weapons systems and creates demand for more sophisticated capabilities.

The Limits of Borrowed Courage

Yet this partnership contains inherent contradictions that expose its transactional nature. Azerbaijan is very independent—they have been willing to challenge everybody when it’s in their crucial national interest. When Russian red lines were at stake during the Karabakh war, Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev was very cautious. He was more cautious than the Turkish leadership. He stopped before the Turks thought he should stop.

The recent India-Pakistan escalation triggered immediate economic retaliation. Affected are 240,000 Indians who traveled to Azerbaijan. Additionally, 330,000 who visited Turkey in 2024 now face boycott calls. Turkey’s support for Pakistan during the May 2025 escalation has reinforced their strategic alliance. However, it has strained Ankara’s relations with New Delhi. These tensions have led to economic boycotts of Turkish goods and services.

Each nation ultimately calculates its own interests first. The Kremlin takes care to remain neutral in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. It maintains close relations with both Armenia and Azerbaijan. Turkey navigated this by providing support without crossing Russian red lines. Similarly, when core interests conflict, the brotherhood rhetoric quickly yields to national priorities.

The Dangerous Mathematics of Mutual Assured Support

The trilateral partnership has created a new form of strategic entanglement. Bilateral and trilateral military cooperation between Azerbaijan, Pakistan, and Turkey is based on friendly and fraternal relations. It also relies on the assumption that conflicts will remain manageable and localized.

Yet regional analysts warn this alliance is fundamentally destabilizing. Critics argue that Turkey wants to be the epicenter of a Turkic-centric order. This ambition naturally challenges Russia’s interests in the Caucasus and Central Asia. The alliance emerges in the East as comprising Turkey, Azerbaijan, Pakistan, and increasingly China versus the U.S. and India, creating new axes of confrontation.

The Iranian Factor

The “Three Brothers—2021” exercises led to heightened tensions between Azerbaijan and Iran. This happened because officials in Tehran perceived the tripartite exercise as threatening. The unifying factor of the triangle appears to be Iran. All three states maintain ostentatiously good relations with it. Each state eyes Tehran with suspicion and wariness of growing Iranian influence in the wider region.

The May 2025 India-Pakistan escalation brought the two nuclear-armed states closer to a major conflict. Turkey was one of the few countries that openly sided with Pakistan. China and Azerbaijan also supported Pakistan during the country’s heightened four-day conflict with India. But would Turkey risk a broader war with India for Pakistan? Would Azerbaijan jeopardize its energy relationships for Kashmir?

Counter-Alliance Formation

The partnership has triggered counter-alignments that threaten regional stability. India is reportedly accelerating arms sales to Armenia. Analysts view this as part of a broader effort to counter the growing strategic alignment between Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Pakistan. Armenia has also expressed support towards India regarding Kashmir. This sets the stage for strengthening alliances among the three Islamic nations, with Armenia and India in opposition.

The partnership works precisely because each conflict has remained contained. Moscow and Ankara agree that they prefer to keep international—and especially Western—involvement in the Karabakh conflict relatively minimal and contained. But escalation dynamics are unpredictable. The same drone technology and military advisors ensured quick victories in limited conflicts. However, they could just as easily drag all three nations into wars they never intended to fight.

The Question of Escalation Control

Here lies the fundamental tension: lending a voice of support in a regional conflict in normal times is one thing. However, when a country is actually at war, who stands with it attains a much greater importance. The trilateral partnership has moved beyond diplomatic support to active military cooperation, creating obligations that may exceed rational strategic calculations.

The Nuclear Dimension

The most alarming development is emerging concerns that rogue elements in the Pakistani military could supply nuclear technology to Turkey. Such concerns appeared particularly real given Turkish-Pakistani military cooperation against Armenia in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war. Reports indicated that Pakistan’s Air Force was training Turkish pilots. There were also discussions of Pakistan lending support to a nuclear program in Turkey.

The leaders discussed the importance of regular joint military exercises. These exercises strengthen their defence capabilities. They also explored potential for joint defence production. The significance of increasing the intensity of bilateral and trilateral joint exercises was stressed. Each exercise deepens interoperability and mutual dependence, making it harder to remain neutral when the shooting starts.

The Limits of Strategic Patience

However, the partnership faces inherent constraints from external powers and internal contradictions. Even sympathetic observers note that geopolitical tensions exist. Tensions, particularly between Armenia and Azerbaijan, may undermine the stability and security of corridors they seek to develop. These tensions hinder economic integration. Competition from maritime routes and Russia’s dominance over other land routes across Eurasia presents threats to their shared ambitions.

The question facing strategists in Ankara, Baku, and Islamabad is this: Have they created a partnership that enhances their security? Or have they created a mutual entanglement that could drag them into conflicts they cannot control?

When brotherhood becomes a strategic liability, will convenience still masquerade as conviction?