Considering the unstable circumstances the Middle East region is currently going through, many residents of the region have started questioning the military capabilities of their countries. Egypt, as a major country in the region with its own historical legacy of a significant power of its army, has also been subject to such questions by its own citizens and neighbors.
Given the seemingly never-ending turmoil in the Middle East, it is often asked whether (i) the Egyptian army is able to defend its lands against any aggression, and (ii) whether it could still deter its enemies and have the ability to join coalition forces to defend itself and its allies. To be able to answer such questions, it is important to evaluate the military capabilities of the Egyptian army and how it has changed over time. The argument here is that it is still a powerful army in terms of its artillery and workforce, which gives it the capability to defend itself and its partners and deter its enemies.
Criteria for Military Spending and Capabilities
Military spending is counted by measuring the strength or weakness of a country’s army. However, “not all military spending means a strong capability to defend”. This is because a country can spend large amounts of money on arms purchases while its soldiers cannot use them. Additionally, military spending is often obscured by “double bookkeeping, the use of off-budget financing, highly aggregated budget categories, security assistance, and governmental manipulation of foreign exchange,” as well as different standards of living. Military spending is also prone to large annual fluctuations; this depends on a country’s sense of threats and the economy’s performance.
The level of spending on a specific sector in the army indicates the type of security threat the country fears the most; e.g., the more a country spends on the naval or air forces, the more it fears threats coming from the air or the sea. For example, one of Egypt’s utmost security concerns is the security of the Suez Canal in the Red Sea, so Egypt spends a lot on its naval forces.
Furthermore, military spending is the total of medium and heavy equipment stocks possessed by a country each year. It also counts the quantity and technological capability of a military. This measures the technological capabilities of a state in comparison with others; this is just measuring the number of arms and technology a state has. This definition is given by the Military Equipment Index. However, in a number of countries, military spending is highly confidential, and it is difficult to assess the state’s spending on this sector. In some non-democratic countries, the military budgets are not discussed in parliaments, and they are kept confidential.
Other critical measurements of military capabilities are the key components of military combat power, including geographic and human resources, training hours, and esprit de corps (which is claimed to be very high among the Egyptian troops).
Henry Conner, Senior Associate Director for the National Security and International Affairs Committee in the USA, divided a country’s military abilities into its readiness (weapons systems, forces, and equipment necessary to accomplish the assigned mission). Conner added that the durability of military might and the advancement of weaponry technology are vital factors when considering a country’s military capability. Another criterion is the force structure, which includes the numbers, size, and composition of units constituting the military forces.
Egypt’s Military Posture: How Effective Is It?
“The Egyptian army has the earth’s best soldiers,” is a famous saying by Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and the motto of the Egyptian Ministry of Defense. The doctrine of the Egyptian army is that it is a “defensive” army, not an “offensive” one.
In January 2024, the Egyptian army ranked top amongst the strongest Arab armies, followed by the Saudi army. Additionally, the Egyptian army ranks 15th in the world out of 142 countries according to Firepower’s 2024 Military Strength Ranking, and it has one of the biggest armies in the MENA region in terms of manpower and major weapons, although its military spending is classified as moderate according to the SIPRI Institute.
The position Egypt has achieved is “based on each nation’s potential war-making capability across land, sea, and air, fought by conventional means”. “The results incorporate values related to manpower, equipment, natural resources, finances, and geography represented by 60+ individual factors”.
The following is also worth mentioning to assess the Egyptian army’s strength and capability to enter a war: The Egyptian army has a large number of troops and participates in many joint military training exercises with other countries to share experiences and to expose its personnel to different military strategies, tactics, and technologies. This was further strengthened under President Sisi’s administration, who, because of domestic and regional security threats, worked on modernizing and training the army since he assumed power in 2014. The domestic threats included the Muslim Brotherhood and its sympathizers, while regional security threats were primarily represented by ISIS and other external actors supporting terrorism. Such factors justified the significant increase in Egypt’s purchase of military weaponry in the decade from 2010 to 2019.
Over the past 50 years, the Egyptian army has participated in numerous wars and shown relevant battlefield effectiveness and martial proficiency. These wars included the October War in 1973, the 1990 Operation Desert Storm, and, more recently, the Egyptian War on Terror, which lasted from 2013 until 2017. The Egyptian military met its objectives in these wars by (i) re-capturing its lands occupied by Israel in 1973; (ii) contributing to the withdrawal of Saddam Hussein’s troops from Kuwait by joining the military coalition with the USA and Saudi Arabia in the 1990s; and (iii) the fulfillment of the mission to end terrorism in Egypt particularly in the Sinai Peninsula by 2018.
In attempting to evaluate the Egyptian military capabilities, one could argue that it is a strong army in terms of personal training and with troops with very high esprit de corps. Additionally, the military is well-equipped with weapons imported from developed countries, while the current administration is also working on diversifying the sources of its military weapons. This means that instead of relying primarily on the USA, Egypt would import weapons from other countries like China, France, Germany, and Russia. For instance, Egypt imported balloons, helicopters, and spacecraft from China worth $80.23 million in 2023, and Rafale fighter jets and FREMM-class frigates from France. Moreover, in 2021, Egypt imported MEKO A-200 EN Frigates and sixteen defense systems from Germany. Egypt purchased air defense systems from Russia that varied between air-air and surface-air missiles, and 50 MiG-29 combat aircraft between 2019 and 2020.The current administration has also managed to develop its own technological capabilities and manufacture some small arms, naval vessels for the armed forces, M1A1 tanks, armored vehicle Sina200, and, recently, a Frigate A-200.
What Weapons Does Egypt Need?
In 2018, Rohan indicated that Egypt became “the world’s fourth largest arms importer in recent years” with diverse global partners. The reason for the high weapons purchasing rate is to signal the Egyptian administration’s efforts to combat terrorism. As a result of the 2013 uprisings against the Muslim Brotherhood regime, the relations between the USA and Egypt became strained. The USA was Egypt’s major arms supplier as a result of the Peace Agreement with Israel in 1979. While relations between Egypt and the USA improved after the current Egyptian administration took office, the government decided to diversify its weapons imports to avoid any disruptions of arms supply to Egypt in case of any future tensions with the USA. The problem of arms supply in Egypt and the Arab Gulf States has been flagged in previous studies conducted by the Strategy and PWC (2022). There are problems facing weapon-importing countries and organizations like the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and Egypt, including supply chain constraints and geopolitical tensions, “which could disrupt supplies and render important assets inoperable”. This is in addition to the lack of R&D necessary to keep up with interchanging regional threats and national priorities. However, such problems are still unresolved in the region due to a number of factors, such as the ongoing wars in Ukraine and Gaza.
The War on Terror in Egypt ended successfully, but the idea of expanding the web of partners for the importation of weapons never disappeared. Instead, Egypt continues to cooperate with various EU members to provide it with new arms and the latest technology in the field, such as Italy, from which Egypt imports 20 Falaj II OPV, and a military satellite. Also, outside the EU, Egypt cooperates with other countries like China, India, Turkey, and Russia, to name a few. Many joint military trainings occur with various African partners such as the Central African Republic, Malawi, and Somalia, as well as Arab countries like Jordan, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Saudi Arabia. Furthermore, the good historical relations with the former Yugoslavian countries extended their bridges to modern times by continuing good relations and military cooperation with Serbia and Croatia.
To conclude, the Egyptian army appears to be able to fight and deter its enemies. All the joint training and new weapons procurements from various countries make Egypt’s military competent in defending its lands and people. However, its capability to fight abroad or against another country remains questionable: given the influx of highly advanced and sophisticated technology the troops have not been exposed to so far, such an endeavor would be a matter of trial and error. Apart from the country’s economic struggles, this is another crucial factor in the rejection of the idea by the current Egyptian administration.
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