Aviation
Military /
Africa
Twice the original order
Egyptian Air Force to acquire 30 new Rafale fighters
Dassault Rafale
Tim Felce (Airwolfhound), CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Gabriela Ramos
5/10/2021
The Egyptian Air Force entered into a new agreement with the French Dassault to acquire 30 new Rafale fighters, totaling 54 aircraft of this model, more than double the original order. With this, Egypt will become the second largest operator of these supersonic aircraft in the world. France currently ranks first.
In 2015, Egypt ordered 24 French aircraft, having become the company's first foreign customer. According to Dassault CEO Eric Trappier, "this new order is proof of the infallible link that unites Egypt, the first foreign user of Rafale, as it was for Mirage 2000, with Dassault Aviation for almost 50 years".
The Egyptian Air Force has in its fleet a large number of Mirage 5 fighters and 15 units of the Mirage 2000, being one of Dassault's most traditional customers. As a result of the supposed discredit of the United States government, the country, which has F-16 units, started to purchase aircraft also from Russia, with 44 Mig-29M fighters, in addition to an order for 24 Su-35 carried out in 2019, and has already started receiving the first models.
Rafale B
Dmitry A. Mottl, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
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Gabriela Ramos
Gabriela is the latest addition to the editorial team of our website, having provided us with her solid background in editing, publishing and photography, and her interest and training in aviation history and historiography. His good taste and common sense and great cleverness and sagacity in the selection of themes and materials greatly enriched our vocabulary and narrative style. Gabriela brought unusual predicates and came to stay, helping to point the way of success of our portal.
   
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