Almost everything related to the Egyptian military is a black box. The number of people serving, their salaries, the military's land holdings, its budget—none of that information is in the public record. Joshua Stacher, a political science professor at Kent State University who studies the Egyptian military, estimates that the military controls somewhere from 33 percent to 45 percent of the Egyptian economy, but there's no way to know for sure.
A Dec. 14 WikiLeaks cable dump exposed something that I had spent months chasing: The civilian regime has tried to neutralize the military's kingmaker powers by establishing it as a major stakeholder in the status quo. In a period of transition, the Egyptian military will be more concerned about whether Egypt's next president will protect its vast economic holdings rather than if he wears a uniform.
But reporting on the military is difficult. No one wants to talk about the subject, and people who are willing to talk don't want their names used. If civilians are worried, Egyptian journalists are petrified. "There is Law 313, [passed in] the year 1956, and it bans you from writing about the army," Hesham Kassem, an independent publisher, told me. "It's the taboo of journalism."
Retired military officers are also seen throughout the middle-management levels of private sector companies "It's a sort of jobs program," says Kent State's Stacher. "They tend to offer them higher salaries as a sort of golden parachute to get them out of the military and into the economy."
An ex-airline industry employee told me that at EgyptAir, the country's national carrier, "a lot of the middle management is becoming ex-m
Jonathan Wright argues to dispells some myths about the Egyptian army:
Here are a few myths about the Egyptian military that I have seen in print since the start of the popular uprising on January 25:
- the myth that the Egyptian military controls up to 40 percent, even 45 percent, of the economy
The ministry's revenues from the private sector are about 2 billion Egyptian pounds a year ($345 million). It employs 40,000 civilians
By way of comparison Egypt's annual GDP is about 1,250 billion Egyptian pounds and the workforce is about 26 million.
- the myth that all or most provincial governors come from the military. In fact, in line with the shift of emphasis under Mubarak from external to internal security, almost all provincial governors have been former police generals since the 1990s
- the myth that the military had a hand in routine policy making throughout the Mubarak era.
When Mubarak faced an insurgency by the Islamic Group in middle Egypt in the 1990s, he relied solely on the Interior Ministry to deal with it and almost all the victims on the government side were policemen. The army stayed aloof.
- the myth that large numbers of retired army generals still hold key positions in state companies and bureaucratic institutions. This was true in the 1960s and 1970s, but the phenomemon has been very much in decline. No former generals have top positions at state banks, for example, where the leadership is entirely professional. The same applies to state media and publishing organisations.
It's hard to overstate how entrenched the military is, acc. to the Time
The army depends on the USA by a substantian part of its budget (up to a fifth? impossible to know how US support is spent, apart that it is for US goods) :
The secrecy begins with the military budget, which Jane's estimates to be about $5 billion. However, one independent researcher has calculated that actual military expenditures could be four or five times larger. Part of the budget is made up of U.S. military assistance of $1.3 billion annually that provides financing for Egypt's major weapons systems. (The funding must be spent on U.S. goods and services and is therefore effectively a subsidy for U.S. defense contractors.) As for the parliamentary committee responsible for overseeing those expenses, it is stuffed with police and military officers; the prospects for meaningful civilian oversight anytime soon are dim.
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