Egyptian Air Defense Command
The Egyptian Air Defense Command or EADC (Arabic: قوات الدفاع الجوي, Quwwat Al-Difa' Al-Jawwi), is Egypt's military command responsible for air defense, part of the Military of Egypt. Egypt patterned its Air Defense Force (ADF) after the Soviet Air Defence Forces, which integrated all its air defense capabilities – antiaircraft guns, rocket and missile units, interceptor planes, and radar and warning installations.
Since 2005 the EADC is commanded by is Lt. General Abd El Aziz Seif-Eldeen.[1] It consists of 30,000 officers & soldiers plus 40,000 conscripts.
History
After most of the country's aircraft was destroyed on ground by Israel during the Six-Day War in 1967, the military placed responsibility for air defense under one commander, the results of which proved positive by the air defense's performance in the 1973 Yom Kippur War.
Weaponry
It is undergoing extensive modernization with bugdetary constraints being the only hindrance to what was once dubbed by Israeli air force generals during the 1973 Ramadan (Yom Kippur) war as "the most extensive and sophisticated air-defense system in the world after the one defending the U.S.S.R...". Currently, it is believed to possess the following weaponry:
Modern low, medium and high altitude SAMs of American, French, Russian design or local license built, including:
Regional Air Defense Missile Systems
Regional/Strategic Perimeter level SAM
- Indigenous Tayer el-Sabah (Morning Bird) (reverse-engineered and modernized SA-2 Guideline S-75 Dvina missile: 40 Batteries (6 single units per Battery, 2 reloads each)(Medium/High Altitude, Long Range SAM)
- MIM-104(PAC-3) missile: 4 Batteries (4 Stationary (towed) units per Battery, 16 missiles per unit plus 2 reloads each)
- Modernized MIM-23 HAWK "Improved HAWK" missile: 18 Batteries (6 SP units per Battery, 3 missiles per unit plus 2 reloads each) (Medium/High Altitude, Medium Range SAM)
- Modernized SA-3 2M Pechora missile: 43 Batteries (each with 2 Stationary units, 4 missiles per Stationary unit plus 1 reload each) (Low/Medium Altitude, Medium Range SAM)
Army Corps/Division level SAM
- Modernized SA-3 2M Pechora missile: 10 Batteries (6 SP units per Battery, 2 missiles per S/P unit plus 1 reload per unit) (Low/Medium Altitude, Medium Range SAM)
- Modernized SA-6 Gainful missile: 14 Batteries (6 SP units per Battery, 3 missiles per unit plus 1 reload each)(Low/Medium Altitude, Medium Range SAM)
Field Point Defense Surface to Air Systems
Army Corps and Division level SAM
- Ground-launched AIM-120 AMRAAM "SLAMRAAM" missile on Humvee: 9 Batteries (4 sp units per battery, 4 Missiles per unit plus 2 reloads each) with ANQ-TPS 67 radar (SP Medium Altitude, Medium/Long Range SAM)
Brigade and Battalion level SAM
- Skyguard "Amoun" anti-aircraft system Aspide 2000 missile: 40 Batteries " 18 battalion + 4 battaries for training " (2 4-cell Aspide missile launchers and 2 Oerlikon GDF-005 twin 35mm guns with one Skyguard Fire Control System per battery).
- Modernized Crotale NG missile: 16 Batteries (9 units per Battery, 4 Missiles per unit plus 2 reloads each)(SP Low/Medium Altitude, Short Range SAM)
- MIM-72/M48 Chaparral low-altitude SAM AIM-9 "Sidewinder": 86 SP units (4 Missiles per unit plus 2 reloads each)(SP Low Altitude, Short Range SAM)
- AN/TWQ-1 Avenger : 75 Batteries ( 4/8 ready-to-fire FIM-92 Stinger missiles + .50 caliber machine gun with an electronic trigger that can be fired from both the Remote Control Unit (RCU) located in the drivers cab, and from the handstation located in the Avenger turret )( provides mobile, short-range air defense protection for ground units against cruise missiles, unmanned aerial vehicles, low-flying fixed-wing aircraft, and helicopters )
By the end of 2008, all missile, radar, command and control systems are to be linked into a complex multi-level, national computerized early-waring air defense command via modified EC-130H Hercules (modified to AWACS-like specifications) transport aircraft, EW AWACS "Grumman" E-2C Hawkeye 2000, EW ECM Beechcraft 1900 ELINT, reconnaissance UAV and underground sheltered-reinforced fiber-optic network.
Air Force and Defence commanders
- list incomplete
- 11 June 1967 to 2 November 1967 Madkour Ahmed [2]
- 2 November 1967 to 2 August 1968 Mohammed Abd El Hamed Helmy [3]
Notes
- ^ Egyptian government. "Lt. Gen. Abd El Aziz Seif-Eldeen". http://www.mmc.gov.eg/branches/airdef/adcommand.htm. Retrieved February 12,2011.
- ^ http://www.mmc.gov.eg/branches/AIRFORCE/gg13.htm
- ^ The Air Force
External links