Sustaining an army of around 130,000 men on a more or less constant war footing was no easy task, though. … This massive task demanded the build-up of state power to an extent unprecedented in Egyptian history and an encroachment by the state on people's lives in a way previously unparalleled.

XREF: Connects to earlier claims about centralized provisioning and state-society relations (loc 418) and nation-state formation requiring monopolized violence (loc 119). Builds on: "Centralized provisioning and conscription altered state-society relations."

Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed…, loc. 894