Egypt Turns Ethiopia’s Su-35s Into Leverage for Long-Range Missiles

The first track is the Rafale. Egypt ordered 24 in February 2015, becoming the jet’s first export customer, and 30 more in May 2021, for 54 in all; deliveries of the second batch are still under way. In September 2026, Cairo asked Dassault for 24 more, which would take the fleet to 78.

Dassault answered with a single global price. Egypt rejected it. Cairo wants the offer split into its parts: the price of the 24 new aircraft at the F4 standard, the cost of bringing the two earlier batches up to F4, and the cost of Meteor missiles if France agrees to supply them. A single package lets a seller hide the cost of upgrades and weapons inside the price of the aircraft and inflate the total. An itemised offer shows Egypt exactly what it is paying for. That is methodical negotiating, and it is new.

The other new element is the deadline. Egypt has told Dassault to answer by 9 December, and to confirm officially that the Meteor will be delivered with the aircraft. That matters because France has never supplied the Meteor to Egypt. Egypt’s Rafales carry the shorter-range MICA, the SCALP cruise missile and the Hammer guided bomb, but not the long-range air-to-air missile that defines the aircraft’s air superiority role.

France will agree. Dassault’s order book stood at 208 Rafales on 30 June 2026, part of a total backlog of about 45 billion euros, more than 50 billion dollars, and the company is struggling to build aircraft fast enough. Its supply chain is being sized for four jets a month by 2029, with a possible step to five decided in 2027. Saudi Arabia is weighing its own Rafale purchase. Any new Egyptian order would be built around 2029 and 2030, with the first jet arriving in late 2030. Paris loses nothing by saying yes to Meteor today.

Egypt is also not an ordinary customer. It opened the Rafale’s export market in 2015, and it showed other governments that a Rafale, built without American components, cannot be blocked by Washington’s export rules. France knows what it owes that relationship.

The second track runs through Lockheed Martin. Egypt operates one of the world’s largest F-16 fleets, more than 200 aircraft ordered over four decades, but none of them carries the AIM-120 AMRAAM. Its F-16s still rely on the older AIM-7 Sparrow. Washington approved AMRAAMs for Egypt only once, in July 2025, as ground-launched interceptors for a NASAMS air defence system, never for its fighters.

Egypt has asked about upgrading its existing jets or buying new F-16 Block 72s, the latest version, with an AESA radar and modern electronic warfare. The request is for 48 aircraft, followed by another 24 when those arrive and a further 24 after that. Lockheed Martin replied that it had no objection and that the Block 72 could be delivered to Egypt.

Cairo refused to treat that as an answer. It wants an official offer from the US government, not a manufacturer’s assessment, and it wants written confirmation that the jets will come with AIM-120 missiles. The deadline for Washington is 16 December.

The United States has little room to refuse. Saudi Arabia has been cleared to buy the F-35: President Donald Trump announced the sale in November 2025, and the State Department approved 48 aircraft in September 2026. Morocco was approved for 25 F-16 Block 72s with AIM-120 missiles in 2019 and for more AIM-120s in December 2024. Egypt is not asking for the F-35, or even the F-15. It is asking for a missile that has been in service for more than three decades and that the United States has already followed with newer weapons. On 10 November, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that “Egypt has been a reliable and good defense partner of the United States.”

Washington will say yes and then play for time. The jets will be approved; the missiles will be “in production”, “short in stock”, or needed elsewhere. Every excuse will be found to stretch the timetable. Egypt should expect that and plan for it.

The third track goes to Beijing. Egypt has looked at China’s J-10C before, and the talks stopped under American pressure, just as Egypt’s Su-35 order did, without Washington offering anything in return. Now Cairo is asking about the J-10CE export version, and specifically when and how China would supply the PL-15 long-range missile with it. China will welcome Egypt with open arms. It has spent this year telling the region that it helped Iran stand up to the United States, and that it can arm others the same way.

The fourth track is the most surprising: 24 Eurofighter Typhoons. The Typhoon is a more expensive and more complicated purchase than the Rafale, because it is built by four countries, the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and Spain, and every major decision, including weapons release, needs their agreement. Egypt’s name has been linked to the Typhoon before, in reports of a large arms package with Italy that never became a signed contract. Closer security ties between Cairo and Brussels give the idea firmer ground now than it had then.

Silent Dossier’s own reading is that the Typhoon has an advantage the price tag hides. Saudi Arabia already flies the Typhoon. Riyadh could help finance an Egyptian purchase, in full or in part, and Egyptian troops are already deployed in Saudi Arabia, as Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty confirmed this week. That is an assessment, not reported fact. But Egypt does not open talks on an aircraft as costly as the Typhoon without a reason.

The minister will review the offers with air force commanders in January, after the December deadlines pass, and decide which way to go.

The rest of the world treats Egypt’s air force as a threat to Israel, as if a long-range missile in Egyptian hands means a strike on Tel Aviv the next day. That is not true. Egypt is not looking at Israel. It is looking at Ethiopia, which is now flying the Su-35, the same fighter Egypt ordered in 2018 and gave up under American pressure. Ethiopia’s jets even wear a desert camouflage that closely resembles the scheme of the batch built for Egypt. Nobody can now tell Cairo that it must wait for permission before it can have the missiles to face them.

Twelve aircraft will not destroy the Egyptian air force or change the military balance between the two countries. Ethiopian media voices have boasted that the jets could strike the pyramids or blow up the Aswan High Dam. In fact, there is no confirmed delivery of beyond-visual-range missiles with Ethiopia’s Su-35s. Russia makes such missiles, the R-77 family, comparable to the Meteor and the AIM-120, but none has been reported arriving in Addis Ababa.

That is the point of Egypt’s December deadlines. Beyond-visual-range missiles will decide all four competitions. Whoever supplies them wins Egypt, and Egypt is no longer willing to accept aircraft without them. The question to China is less a threat to buy Chinese than a message to Washington: do not count on Egypt staying quiet while others decide what it may and may not own. From now on, Egypt will acquire what serves its interest, and if its partners will not support it, a neighbour that has just bought 12 advanced fighters gives Cairo every reason to look elsewhere.