Total Egyptian front-line tank strength is believed to consist of 1,000 T-54/T-55S, 500 T-62s, 1,459 M60 series MBTs (759 M60A3 supplied brand new and 700 M60A1 delivered in 1991/1992) and 555 M1A1 MBTs. Royal Ordnance has been supplying new 115 mm gun barrels to Egypt for several years.

In the 1970s, several hundred Egyptian T-54/T-55/ T-62 MBTs were fitted with German AEG/Telefunken white/infra-red searchlights to the right of the main armament and some were also fitted with the Iskra laser range-finder. Some Egyptian T-62s have also been fitted with two launchers either side of the turret rear for surface-to-surface smoke rockets.

Late in 1984, General Dynamics Land Systems was awarded a US$150 million contract to build a new tank plant outside Cairo. The facility is called Factory 200 and will overhaul US-supplied M60A3 and M88A1 armoured vehicles.

Factory 200 is also referred to as the Egyptian Tank Plant and this is where production of the M1A1 MBT was undertaken for the Egyptian Army.

Early in 1990 Egypt announced that it had accepted an offer from the United States for 700 M60A1 MBTs free of charge, with Egypt only having to pay for the shipping costs. All of these had been delivered by early 1992.

Egypt would like to upgrade the M60A1 MBTs to the more recent M60A3 standard, enabling its whole M60 fleet to be of the same configuration.

Late in 1988 the USA and Egypt signed a Memorandum of Understanding allowing Egypt to co-produce up to 555 General Dynamics Land Systems M1A1 MBTs. Under the terms of this MoU some 40 per cent of the tank's components would be manufactured in Egypt with the remainder being produced in the USA and shipped to Egypt for final assembly.

The first 25 M1A1 MBTs have been shipped direct from the United States to Egypt and they were followed by partly assembled tanks and then kits.

The first co-produced M1A1 MBT rolled off the production line at the Egyptian Tank Plant in June 1992. The Egyptian Army M1A1 is identical to that built for the US Army except that it does not have the special heavy armour package as fitted to late production M1A1 MBTs.

Egypt will not be allowed to export any of the tanks without the permission of the USA and in the final stages of the project a maximum of 35 per cent of the M1A1 was made in Egypt.

In April 1989, the US DoD announced that General Dynamics Land Systems had been awarded a contract for Manufacturing Technical Assistance (MTA) to support the co-production of M1A1 MBTs in Egypt.

Although the original intention was for a total of 555 M1A1 s, this was initially reduced to 524, with the first 25 coming direct from General Dynamics Land Systems and the remaining 499 being assembled in Egypt and divided up into six increments:

(1) 75 produced from July 1992 through to August 1993 with the US providing the turret, welded hull and all hull components in kits. The Egyptians added brackets and harnesses to the engines and did assembly work on the power pack. In addition they also assembled hull components, ground the race ring that holds the turret to the hull and did some initial painting

(2)100 produced from September 1993 to September 1994 with additional work being performed in Egypt including welding 200 accessories to the hull and installing the rear grill door

(3)92 vehicles produced from September 1994 through to August 1995 with additional tasks including hull machining, welding additional accessories, torsion bar tunnel welding, sponson installation, top deck fabrication, turret assembly and prime paint. During this period Factory 200 began to receive the 120 mm main armament and gun mount from Factory 100

(4) Covered 100 vehicles produced from September

1995 through to August 1996 with additional tasks in Egypt including turret machining, all accessory welding, ammunition door installation and turret prime and paint

(5) This covered 100 vehicles produced from August

1996 through to September 1997 with additional tasks performed including hull fabrication, plate flame cutting, plate straightening, all edge preparation, component subassembly for the hull and hull structures fabrication

(6) This is the final batch of 32 vehicles and was produced from September 1997 through to late 1998.

Early in 1996 Egypt decided to restore 31 M1A1s to the programme, so the total is now 555 vehicles.

Discussions are taking place between Egypt and the United States on the future of Factory 200 following the completion of the M1A1 MBT programme. Funding permitting, there is a possibility that a further 200 M1A1 MBTs will be assembled in Egypt in two blocks of 100.