Military Intelligence and Reconnaissance (Egypt)

The Military Intelligence and Reconnaissance Administration (Arabic: إدارة المخابرات الحربية والاستطلاع, romanized: Idarah Al Mukhabarat Al Ḥarbiya Wal Istitlaʾ), is the national military intelligence agency of the Egyptian Ministry of Defense responsible for analysis and development of intelligence gathering and counterintelligence systems to create national military security, black operations, counter foreign military intelligence, counterterrorism, foreign military intelligence threat gathering and assessment to national security, and support hybrid warfare operations.

It is one of three main entities in the Egyptian Intelligence Community, along with the General Intelligence Service (GIS) and National Security Agency (NSA).

A number of senior officers of the Egyptian Armed Forces (Al-Qūwāt Al-Musallaḥah Al-Maṣrīya) have led the agency, including Field Marshal Abd Al-Halim Abu-Ghazala, a former defence minister, Gen. Omar Suleiman, the former vice president and former head of the General Intelligence Service, and Major General Murad Muwafi President of the General Intelligence Service, who was appointed successor to Suleiman in January / December 2011.

Specialties of the agency include black operations particularly those involving the capture or kill high-value targets, collecting information on enemy formations and preparations in wartime and peacetime, counter foreign military intelligence, counterterrorism, geographical surveys, special reconnaissance to discover enemy movements, and support hybrid warfare operations. The agency has also, since the time of Gamal Abdel Nasser, conducted an internal mission to detect anti-regime elements within the military.

Historically, the agency suffered two major blows: failing to predict the Israeli attack on Egypt in the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, and failing to stop the assassination of President Anwar Sadat by Islamists linked to the military in 1981. According to General Mohammad Sadiq (1917–1991), director of intelligence during the 1967 war, the most important reason for the intelligence failure then was the lack of coordination between GIS and military intelligence.