Speaking during an interview with Osama Kamal on DMC’s “Masa’a DMC” programme, Lieutenant General Al-Toudi said cyberwarfare now forms part of a wider transformation in modern conflicts, which have shifted from conventional battles between regular armies to complex hybrid wars involving ballistic missiles, drones, proxy warfare, information operations, and intelligence activity.
He said cyberattacks can strike the information infrastructure of key sectors such as petroleum facilities and power stations, making them “a new weapon” with a strong impact on states and the course of wars.
Al-Toudi said the Air Defence Forces’ automated command-and-control centre applies the highest security standards, adding that the force has raised awareness of cyber threats and trained personnel on procedures to confront them.
He added that the Air Defence Forces exchange expertise with the private sector and friendly countries on cybersecurity, while the General Command of the Armed Forces has given the file major attention in recent years.
The Armed Forces have qualified officers in cybersecurity, with some obtaining master’s and doctoral degrees from Egypt and abroad, Al-Toudi explained.
He revealed that major working groups have been formed in every branch of the Egyptian Armed Forces, along with a centralized group at the Armed Forces level, to secure computers, communications systems, information-transfer systems, and identification systems.
The Air Defence Forces also use national programmes, including encryption systems, to secure communications, information transfers, and identification systems, he said.
Al-Toudi stressed that modern warfare has undergone a “radical transformation” due to rapid technological development, the evolution of combat doctrines, and changes in military organizational structures.
He said recent conflicts have become “hybrid and smart wars,” combining traditional weapons with cyberattacks, psychological operations, electronic warfare, drones, ballistic missiles, and proxy forces.
Ballistic missiles, he noted, have developed significantly in recent years through the use of hypersonic glide vehicles, multiple-warhead systems, and artificial intelligence technologies that allow missiles to alter their paths mid-flight and select targets automatically.
This has made interception more difficult and has pushed air defence systems to evolve in parallel, he said.
Lieutenant General Al-Toudi said modern air defence now relies on diverse radars, advanced sensor networks, multi-layered defence systems, and artificial intelligence, alongside counter-drone technologies such as lasers, directed energy, and electronic jamming.
He also warned of the growing role of intelligence operations in modern conflicts, saying some tactics involve recruiting agents from within targeted countries to carry out assassinations, destroy command centres, and attack airbases and air defence systems using drones or anti-armour missiles.
Recent wars, he said, have combined all these tools, changing the nature of conflict from ground battles involving troops and tanks to highly complex “smart wars.”
Al-Toudi concluded that these developments have given armies unprecedented combat capabilities, making the current deterrence balance between parties to conflicts “extremely complex.”
The remarks came as Egypt’s Air Defence Forces marked their 56th anniversary, which falls on 30 June every year and commemorates the construction of the Missile Wall in 1970 during the War of Attrition.
Al-Toudi said during the anniversary events that Egypt’s skies are protected by air defence personnel at the highest levels of readiness and combat preparedness, adding that the Missile Wall built by earlier generations remains “strong and renewed” through modern weapons systems and continued development.
The anniversary coincided with Egypt’s marking of the 30 June Revolution, which President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi described on Tuesday as a national milestone that embodied Egyptians’ will to preserve the state’s identity and restore its path toward the future.
On the same day, El-Sisi received Lieutenant General Ashraf Salem Zaher, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and Minister of Defence and Military Production, in a meeting that also coincided with the Air Defence Forces’ anniversary.
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