The real successes of the 70s were the Cascavel and Urutu. Thousands were built and hundreds are still in use today. Most notably, they found tremendous popularity abroad. An export version was made with the Panhard AML’s stronger 90 mm gun. This required shipping the vehicles to France for mounting the turret and the French, beginning to see Engesa as a competitor, gave impossibly high prices. An alternative was found in producing Societé Générale’s Cockerill cannon, also 90 mm, under licence within Brazil.
Tens of militaries in Africa, the Mediterranean and, most importantly, the Middle East, purchased Engesa vehicles and they saw combat in several conflicts such as the Libya-Egypt border clash, the Iran-Iraq war and the Gulf war. Third World clients enjoyed the company’s cheap and reliable products, its filling of gaps in Western and Soviet sales, its proximity to their problems and its aid in maintenance. The regime oversaw Engesa’s sales and sometimes blocked sales on geopolitical grounds, such as for Honduras and El Salvador, when it was claimed that arms deliveries would stimulate conflict. Yet elsewhere there was no issue selling to tense regions and anti-American regimes.
While the Cascavel and Urutu were highly successful, only 63 Jararacas were exported. It was generally not well received.
The earliest, and later, most loyal Engesa clients were in the Gulf. The first buyer was Qatar, which acquired 20 Cascavéis; the UAE then sought 200 in 1977, and Libyans and Iraqis soon followed. (Through Libya the Cascavel also found its way to rebels in Western Sahara and Chad).
Ba’athist Iraq was the closest client and had a long partnership with the company. U$ 30 billion flowed in Brazilian-Iraqi trade between 1976 and 1990, and Engesa was an important part of that. Another was Avibras which sold rocket systems.
Selling to Iraq was a complex task and the company’s organizational capabilities advanced to meet the challenge. An informal channel of connections with Iraqi military and political figures facilitated contact. Company agents worked in cross-functional teams in which technical and sales personnel shared functions. Engesa’s service was marked by flexibility. As Iraqi servicemen had difficulty handling the equipment and many were illiterate it provided instructional videos and color-coded different ammunition types. Unlike Soviet and Western providers, it was open to doing whichever modifications its clients wished, such as installing different engines or turrets that could use Soviet ammunition. It even made replacement parts for vehicles it did not design and outside of its area of expertise, such as T-series tanks and Mig jets. Company personnel were psychologically to their Iraqi counterparts: when the latter made mistakes, European providers only reacted negatively, whereas Brazilians would comment they made the same error five years earlier and call for a correction.