During the 1973 October War, Shafik was a senior fighter pilot under Hosni Mubarak's command. Shafik shot down two Israeli aircraft during the war on 14 October 1973. During his 40 years of service in the Egyptian Air Force as a fighter pilot, he flew several types of fighter jets including the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17, Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-19, Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 and the Dassault Mirage 2000; he also acted as the wing commander for the Egyptian Air Force acrobatic team. He is also fully qualified on the American-built McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II and the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon. In 1984, Shafik was appointed military attaché in the Egyptian Embassy in Rome. He continued in this role until 1986. In 1986, he was promoted to Air Commodore and became commander of a Group and Mig-21 Airbase. During the CSF conscription riot of 1986, President Mubarak wanted the Armed Forces to crush the revolt. He relied on the Air Force to intimidate and bomb some CSF rebels in Cairo and Upper Egypt. The commander who was tasked with the actual execution of the operation was Brigadier/Air Commodore Ahmed Shafik, as Deputy Chief of Operations (Fighter-Bomber) for the Central Air Region. From 1988 to 1991, Shafik served several military senior command positions before he was appointed as the Commander of the Air Operations Department. In September 1991, Shafik was appointed as the Air Force's Chief of Staff, holding this position until April 1996, when he became Commander of the Egyptian Air Force. In 2002 he resigned from military service and was succeeded by his chief-of-staff Air Marshal Magdy Galal Sharawi. Political career After retiring from the Air Force, Shafiq became the Minister of Civil Aviation on 18 September 2002, not long after the Ministry's formation. Whilst he was the minister for civil aviation, he oversaw improvements in EgyptAir and helped construct a new third terminal at Cairo International Airport which was completed in 2008 and opened for commercial operations on 27 April 2009. He continued the position until succeeding Ahmed Nazif as the Prime Minister of Egypt on 29 January 2011. During the course of the Egyptian Revolution of 2011, Shafik was named prime minister by then president Hosni Mubarak on 29 January 2011. Shafik's period in office as prime minister was short-lived, lasting just over a month, after he resigned on 3 March due to pressure from protestors and the opposition. They had