Given these developments, the Mecca Agreement looks less like an alliance against Iran than a response to the unravelling of the American-led regional order. That relationship will not disappear, and Saudi Arabia has no reason to exchange one form of dependence for another. Other mechanisms could develop around it, and a regional system encompassing Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Pakistan, Iran, Egypt, and other states is no longer inconceivable. From Tehran's perspective, that would represent a strategic achievement far more important than dominating Saudi Arabia or imposing Iranian hegemony on the Gulf. How much the Mecca Agreement will contribute to such a system is far from certain.