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Numbering at least 468,000 men - officials refuse to give the exact number saying it could hurt national security - Egypt's combined army, air force, air defense command, navy and paramilitaries make up the largest military force in the Arab world. More than half of those in uniform are conscripts.

One of the keys to the military's power is its grip on business, which was strengthened after Egypt's 1979 peace deal with Israel. Under that accord, the military had to shrink its forces. But instead of sacking hundreds of thousands of men, commanders opened factories to employ them. Those plants now produce everything from components for ammunition to pots and pans, fire extinguishers, and cutlery. The military also runs banks, tourism operations, farms, water treatment plants, a petrol station chain, construction firms, and import companies.Businesses owned solely by the military are exempt from tax, and often built on the backs of poorly paid conscripts, who make between $17 and $28 a month, although they are fed by the army and receive basic medical help. "A conscript goes into the army less for training, and more for working in one of the military factories or business schemes,"

the military establishment is likely to retain significant powers, no matter who wins the two-round presidential election

the armed forces have de facto control over all unused land in Egypt, or about 87 percent of the country

Many soldiers feel the U.S. money benefits American arms manufacturers and forces Egypt to buy outdated weaponry. Egypt, they say, needs to be able to make its own money to advance.

"The armed forces will not allow any interference into its business projects. This is a matter of national security," said Nasr.

"Previously the military budget was subject to specific laws and was not in any constitution," said General Mamdouh Shahine, who is responsible for legal affairs on the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, which has run Egypt since Mubarak's ouster. "But now we want to bring it under the new constitution to ensure stability. By adding budgetary clauses to the constitution, I am simply asserting a reality that has existed for a long time. What is the problem with that?"

The spark for the soldiers' rebellion in Alexandria was a brutal episode in Cairo. On October 9 last year, a group of Coptic Christians converged on Cairo's television station to protest at the burning of a church. In a neighborhood called Maspero, the protesters clashed with soldiers; about 25 civilians were killed.The army says soldiers were also killed in the violence. The lieutenant colonel with direct knowledge of the rebellion at the Air Defence Institute said one officer and 22 soldiers died. Those who survived were seriously injured and some were disabled, according to a source at the military judiciary. Among other things Air Defence Institute officers demanded was financial compensation for the families of those dead.

There are also problems with training, which four senior officers said was evident in the poor handling of tanks and armored personnel carriers on the streets during last year's protests. At Maspero, inexperienced soldiers in charge of armored carriers injured protesters inadvertently, one recently retired general responsible for devising training systems for the military said.

"stay away from politics or organized religion, don't outshine your commander, don't think about improving the system."

While most soldiers and officers are religious, the military does not allow religious organizations to set up within its ranks.

"You must remember that at the end of the day, the army is patriotic," said the colonel. "Many of the rank and file refuse to rebel because they feel the country depends on them and they are the last institution standing. They want change but they would rather wait until a civilian government is formed."

Clashes also happened between protesters and security forces in Egypt's second city of Alexandria

Blocking websites like Facebook and Twitter would have angered the business masters in whose lap [Hosni Mubarak’'s son] Gamal Mubarak was sitting. It was an unholy coalition between the sponsors of the corrupt regime and the popular social-networking Web sites.

youths in Egypt, pre-revolution, lived two lives, one online and one off-line. The off-line life is very limited in access to information, freedom of speech and mobilization, and even in access to each other. For decades, it was illegal for five people to gather for any reason (per emergency law), although it was tolerated except when it was politically motivated. Online political activists used terms like “group,” “room,” and “comment” as if they had physical meanings. The Internet offered an open environment that politicized the youths, allowed them to raise awareness on possibilities of shaping their future, diversified their perspectives, anonymized their identities, gave them the taste of free speech, and pushed them to see through the regime propaganda and despise it.

Since the Egyptian government had made the brick-and-mortar world so unfriendly to free expression and the Internet was so readily available to just tweet, update Facebook, or send a quick blog post, it became the space to express your thoughts or post a news item. As the people posted live, people would react live and a conversation developed. I believe 2010 was a tipping point for this interaction; we went from conversation to a public debate, and just not with activists but with a larger, less engaged tech-savvy population. Administrators were very deliberate in cultivating a relationship with this population.

none of the administrators in Egypt, for obvious reasons, could use his real Facebook identity to administer the page, and that was a violation of Facebook terms and conditions. Nadine, given her relatively safer location, was the firewall whenever Facebook realized the fake identities we used and deleted them. She would give us back access.

the most important factor in triggering the Egyptian revolution was the effect of Tunisia’s revolution, which did not start on Facebook. Neither did any of the other Arab revolutions. If it weren’t for Facebook, the Egyptian revolution would have started anyway. The effect of a Facebook call to a timed revolution with a large outreach (that activated an organized political activist community that’s been in the making for decades) is making the revolution shorter, more organized, with fewer casualties and more theatrical. These are important effects, especially to reduce casualties. But the multitude of factors involved with the startup, the process, and the success of the Egyptian revolution makes the Facebook effect a minor one

the angle that I hear most on Arab revolutions in Western media is the social media/Facebook/Internet one, rather than the more important, stronger and more direct effect of the injustice perpetuated by the dictators sponsored by Western regimes.

We have to remember that 850 people died. Not just Facebook profiles but flesh and blood people