Egypt’s accelerating negotiations with Saab for the acquisition of the GlobalEye airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft mark a decisive inflection point in Cairo’s long-term air and maritime surveillance doctrine. More than a routine procurement, the talks signal a growing recognition within the Egyptian defence establishment that the regional threat environment has fundamentally outpaced the capabilities of legacy Cold War-era systems still forming the backbone of national early-warning architecture.
At the centre of this reassessment is the prospective replacement of the E-2C Hawkeye, which has served as Egypt’s primary airborne surveillance platform since the late 1980s. While the Hawkeye once represented a sophisticated capability, Egyptian planners increasingly view it as misaligned with contemporary operational realities defined by low-observable aircraft, long-range cruise missiles, armed unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and complex maritime “grey-zone” threats.
Momentum behind the GlobalEye negotiations became particularly visible at the Paris Air Show in June 2025, where Saab intensified engagement with Egyptian officials. The timing underscored Cairo’s urgency to close widening capability gaps as instability in Libya, persistent counter-insurgency operations in the Sinai Peninsula and escalating insecurity in the Red Sea converge into a single, highly complex strategic burden.
Saab has positioned GlobalEye not merely as an aircraft, but as what it explicitly calls a “national asset” for peace, crisis and war. Saab Chief Executive Officer Micael Johansson reinforced the programme’s export readiness by stating that the company is “investing to deliver more aircraft per year,” signalling that production scalability is no longer a limiting factor for prospective customers such as Egypt.
From Cairo’s perspective, the limitations of the E-2C Hawkeye—despite periodic upgrades—are no longer theoretical. They now impose tangible operational constraints, particularly as modern conflicts demand persistent, integrated surveillance across air, sea and land domains rather than platform-specific sensor silos.
The Egyptian Air Force currently operates seven to eight E-2C Hawkeyes under the 601 Air Wing at Cairo West Air Base. Acquired between 1986 and 1993, the aircraft were introduced when Egypt’s primary airborne surveillance requirement centred on detecting conventional air threats rather than orchestrating joint, multi-domain command and control.
Upgrades in the early 2000s brought the fleet to the Hawkeye 2000 standard, incorporating the APS-145 radar capable of tracking more than 2,000 targets at ranges exceeding 640 kilometres. At the time, this placed Egypt among the region’s more capable AEW&C operators.
However, inherent design limitations have become increasingly problematic. With a service ceiling of roughly 10,600 metres, a maximum speed near 600 kilometres per hour and an endurance of about six hours, the turboprop-powered E-2C struggles to provide persistent coverage and survivability in high-threat environments.
Egypt’s 2015 air operations against ISIL targets in Libya demonstrated the Hawkeye’s operational value, but also highlighted its dependence on relatively uncontested airspace and extensive ground-based support. As airborne threats diversified to include terrain-hugging cruise missiles, swarming UAVs and low-observable platforms, the E-2C’s radar geometry and processing architecture increasingly required support from complementary sensors to remain effective.
Maintenance demands have risen steadily as the fleet approaches four decades of service, while diminishing upgrade pathways have rendered further life-extension investments strategically inefficient. Compounding these issues, the Hawkeye’s primary focus on airborne targets limits its utility at a time when Egypt’s security calculus increasingly prioritises maritime domain awareness in the Red Sea and Mediterranean.
Integration challenges further complicate matters. Egypt operates a heterogeneous mix of U.S., Russian, Chinese and European air-defence systems, and fusing Hawkeye data with non-U.S. networks introduces both technical and political friction. Collectively, these factors have transformed the E-2C from a strategic enabler into a capability ceiling.
A fundamentally different AEW&C paradigm
GlobalEye represents a break from the carrier-derived, altitude-limited philosophy of the Hawkeye. Mounted on the Bombardier Global 6000 business jet airframe, the system enables sustained operations at altitudes of up to 16,000 metres, cruise speeds exceeding 1,100 kilometres per hour and an inter-theatre range approaching 11,000 kilometres.
Endurance exceeding 11 hours allows GlobalEye to maintain continuous overwatch across vast theatres—from Red Sea shipping corridors to eastern Mediterranean airspace and Egypt’s western desert frontier—while sharply reducing sortie generation pressure, crew fatigue and logistical strain.
At the core of GlobalEye’s sensor suite is Saab’s Erieye Extended Range active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar, capable of detecting fighter-sized targets at distances of up to 450 kilometres while retaining high tracking fidelity in cluttered and electronically contested environments. This is augmented by Leonardo’s SeaSpray 7500E maritime radar, which can detect surface contacts down to periscope depth—directly addressing Egypt’s growing concerns over submarine proliferation, irregular naval threats and congested sea lanes.
Electro-optical and infrared sensors provide visual identification and target confirmation, while ground moving target indication (GMTI) modes enable persistent tracking of land-based movements, a capability particularly relevant for counter-insurgency and border-security missions in Sinai and along the Libyan frontier.
Automatic Identification System (AIS) integration and inverse synthetic aperture radar further enhance maritime awareness, enabling precise classification and behavioural analysis of surface traffic. Five onboard operator consoles, supported by secure datalinks, satellite communications and voice channels, allow GlobalEye to function as a distributed command-and-control node rather than a single-mission radar aircraft.
Operating at high altitude, GlobalEye can detect low-level threats flying at approximately 200 feet from distances exceeding 458 kilometres—far beyond the reach of ground-based radars constrained by terrain masking and the curvature of the Earth.
A defence analyst quoted in regional reporting summarised the shift by noting, “The GlobalEye represents a leap in multi-domain surveillance, offering Egypt enhanced maritime awareness crucial for protecting vital sea lanes.” That assessment aligns closely with Egypt’s strategic geography.
In the Red Sea, where Houthi missile attacks and maritime sabotage threaten global shipping, long-range maritime surveillance offers early warning against asymmetric surface and aerial threats. Over the Mediterranean, extended airborne coverage strengthens Egypt’s ability to monitor airspace incursions and naval movements linked to intensifying regional competition. Along the Libyan border, persistent surveillance mitigates risks posed by militant infiltration and illicit arms flows.
Crucially, GlobalEye’s architecture supports joint operations rather than platform-specific responses, enabling Egyptian naval, air and ground forces to operate from a shared, real-time operational picture.
Compared with alternatives such as Boeing’s E-7 Wedgetail or the E-2D Advanced Hawkeye, GlobalEye offers superior endurance and multi-domain versatility at a potentially lower cost. Unit prices are estimated at USD 300–500 million per aircraft, including support packages—an important consideration given Egypt’s fiscal constraints.
Discussions reportedly centre on acquiring a limited fleet under flexible financing arrangements, underscoring Cairo’s preference for prioritising strategic enablers over numerical force expansion.
Strategically, the pursuit of GlobalEye reflects Egypt’s intent to reduce overreliance on U.S.-centric defence ecosystems, shaped by episodic geopolitical frictions and the belief that sovereign situational awareness should not be vulnerable to external political conditionality. Sweden’s export control framework offers Cairo greater latitude to integrate the system across its diverse inventory of Russian, Chinese and Western platforms.
Saab’s collaboration with CAE on training and simulation further lowers barriers to rapid operationalisation, ensuring that doctrine and crew proficiency evolve alongside hardware induction.
The presence of established GlobalEye operators such as the United Arab Emirates and France strengthens interoperability prospects and reinforces confidence in the platform’s maturity. France’s December 2025 decision to procure two GlobalEye aircraft valued at SEK 12.3 billion served as a powerful validation signal, positioning the system as a trusted capability among advanced air forces.
For Egypt, replacing the E-2C Hawkeye with GlobalEye would recalibrate how it conceptualises early warning and joint-force coordination, shifting from a platform-centric model to a sensor-fusion-driven architecture. While financial and integration challenges remain, the strategic dividends—extended battlespace visibility, faster decision cycles and enhanced survivability—appear to outweigh the risks.
The acquisition would secure Egypt’s situational awareness across air, sea and land, reinforcing national decision-making sovereignty in an era where information dominance increasingly defines deterrence and conflict outcomes.
