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National Security Policy Making
Context, Jurisprudence and Process in Kenya

National Security Policy Making: Context, Jurisprudence and Process in Kenya examines the context of national security policy making in Kenya. It inspects the role of law especially the Constitution in national security policy. Its basis is that jurisprudence and process provide the proper environmental background for creative problem solving in national security policy in Kenya. The book is concerned with the strategic level of national security policy, and its interactions with the evolving national security jurisprudence, anchored in the Constitution of Kenya [2010]. It also examines the structure of national security in Kenya, the constitutional philosophy of national security in Kenya, the National Security Council and issues of the coordination of national security in Kenya.

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Reviews

Prof Githu Muigai

Professor Makumi Mwagiru is one those rare academics who traverse several academic disciplines with equal ease. He is an international lawyer, a practitioner and scholar of diplomacy, and a geopolitical and national security expert, and an International Conflict Analyst. And above all, he writes with facility, great ease and wit.
In his new book National Security Policy Making: Context, Jurisprudence and Process in Kenya, Prof Mwagiru draws on his deep understanding of the challenges of national security policy formulation, derived from long years of interaction with the crème de crème of Kenya’s policy making professionals at the National Defence College of Kenya; and his involvement in pioneering the MA programme on Diplomacy, Intelligence and Security [MDIS] at Strathmore University in Nairobi, in 2018. The stated aim of the latter programme, the first of its kind in Kenya and the region, is to link the three areas of diplomacy, intelligence and security in the context of national security policy and the environment in which these three are investigated, which is Kenya, East Africa, Africa and the rest of the world.
These three themes - Diplomacy, Intelligence and Security – have not previously received the attention they deserve from African academics thus making this book that much more relevant and necessary. There seems to be a somewhat widely shared assumption that the three thematic areas of the book are to be “practiced” not “studied”. Yet, as this book demonstrates there is much to be gained in engaging in a serious academic discourse on them.
This book while specifically addressing the question of national security policy achieves several objectives. First, it provides an analytical framework for the relationship between policy and strategy in national security. Secondly, it explores the corpus of security law, within both international law and domestic law. It draws a strategic map of the content of the national security law applicable to Kenya. Thirdly, it investigates the character of national security policy as developed by national security organs in Kenya, and in particular the National Security Council. Further, it inspects the issues relating to the coordination of national security policy. It also discusses the legal issues relating to some aspects of national security in Kenya. It examines war powers in Kenya, the legal-strategic aspects of Kenya’s intervention in Somalia, and generally of the war on terror, and finally some perspectives of the maritime conflict between Somalia and Kenya. Finally, the book explores contemporary issues and challenges in the field of national security law and policy.
This book in my view confirms a view I have long held: that national security is not, as appears to be the assumption in many countries, the preserve of the armed forces. It is essentially, in a constitutional democracy a function of the civil authorities properly advised by well-informed experts.
This book provides students – and practitioners - of national security, national intelligence, law and diplomacy with a critical African perspective.

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Grand Strategy in Kenya
Vol.1 : Concepts,Context,Process and Ethics

Volume 1 of Grand Strategy in Kenya is the second book on issues of Grand Strategy from a Kenyan perspective. The book is the output of the Three Legs Consortium's Working Group on Grand Strategy. The chapters in the book covers a wide range of issues related to grand strategy: conceptualization of grand strategy, and processes of grand strategy formulation, implementation and coordination. It also inspects issues related to the configuration of Kenya's neighborhood, leadership and ethics in grand strategy formulation, the constitutional basis of grand strategy in Kenya, and the institutionalization of the grand strategy making process.

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Reviews

Prof. Aparajita Biswas

I was honoured by the invitation of my friend, Professor Makumi Mwagiru, a leading academic of Kenya, to write a Foreword to this book. I enjoyed reading the pre-publication manuscript. Much to my delight, I found it stunningly illuminating in terms of developing a discourse on strategic thinking in Kenya.
A grand strategy is the highest level of national statecraft that refers to a collection of plans and policies that deliberately bind a state’s political, military, diplomatic and economic tools together, to advance the state’s national interests. In other words, it refers to the application of a state’s various resources to safeguard its security. The term ‘Grand Strategy’ was coined by the British strategist, B.H. Liddell Hart, in Strategy in 1967 (originally published in 1929). He emphasized that grand strategy is about more than winning the war but also achieving “a state of peace, and of one’s people [that] is better after the war than before.” It helps us to understand why, how, and for what purposes states exercise their national power, including the crucible of military force. The concept emerged from the military domain and refers to what is necessary for the successful use of military force in wartime and peacetime.
The book Grand Strategy in Kenya, edited by Lt. Gen. (Rtd.) Humphrey Njoroge and Prof. Makumi Mwagiru, identifies Kenya’s national interests, and the existing threats and potential challenges to the country’s security. It successfully deals with the diverse range of issues like formulation, implementation and coordination of grand strategy of Kenya in the context of complexities of its national security paradigm. The chapters in the book highlight Kenya’s foreign policy orientation and territorial threats, depicting the challenges Kenya has faced as a result of porous borders. It attempts to explain the objectives of the Grand Strategy of Kenya vis-a-vis its neighbouring states that have continued to claim or attempted to claim parts of its territory, hence threatening its territorial integrity.
The editors have done a considerable service by drawing together many of the diverse threads of national security strategy of Kenya into a coherent whole. They consider political and military strategy elements as part of a larger decision making process influenced by economic, technological, cultural, and historical factors.
Drawing upon rich and diverse narratives that have informed Kenya’s strategic discourse, security and foreign policy, the book charts a new agenda for strategic thinking on post- colonial Kenya from a non-Western perspective. The chapters stress the profound changes of Kenya’s approach to national security after the enactment of progressive new Constitution in 2010 which not only provides a robust framework for national security paradigm, but has also institutionalised national security structures by establishing administrative structures like the National Security Council.
I know of no other recent volume that addresses the entire national security milieu in such a logical manner and yet also manages to address current concerns so thoroughly. It is equally remarkable that they have addressed so many contentious problems meticulously.
This book will be invaluable to scholars, students, diplomats, foreign policy specialists and anyone who wishes to learn how a state or a nation formulates its Grand Strategy. I hope that this effort will stimulate debate and discussion in the coming years and will be of use in fostering consensus on important elements of Kenya’s national security strategy.

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Prof. Stephen Chan

How can Kenya defend itself, and also project itself into its region without antagonizing others? At time of writing, Al Shabaab militants had just assaulted the Dusit Hotel and office complex, at Riverside Drive, Nairobi with many fatalities. The response of Kenyan special forces was immaculate, but questions were raised about why intelligence concerning an impending assault had not been acted upon. Clearly, the securitization of the Kenyan state is still a work in progress. In this process, and with volatility in the region, can Kenya afford to contemplate grand strategy as a kind of utopic securitization? Or must formulators of strategy be acutely aware of specific challenges and contemplate them in all their most minute measures? The choice, in real life terms is neither grand in the utopic sense, nor so minute that detail obliterates the larger pictures. That Kenyan grand strategy is in need of review is evident in that Kenya is being attacked. But has the nature of Kenyan military intervention in Somalia been responsible for this? Could this intervention have been more subtle and employed social and psychological forces as much as military ones? Grand strategy requires grand self-criticism.
The authors of this volume have laid out in deeply considered manners all those factors that must be borne in mind when contemplating a grand strategy. Kenya exists in a dynamic neighborhood, so that dynamism must be harnessed to the national effort. The national effort necessarily becomes an international one - but modalities of intersecting with Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Ethiopia - even Swaziland - run into problems of grand regionalism which, in the quarrels of the region, is not very grand. In short, grand strategy might concern preparedness for an existential threat, but is not an existential undertaking. The authors are aware of this and present a contemplative but real- world agenda for policy-makers.
Will policy-makers read and digest this agenda? I for one hope they will. It is a rare occurrence in Africa for a volume of this sort to appear. It says much about a society that accords sufficient freedom for contemplation and debate about affairs- of-state in the most important sense. I myself hope that much will come out of this. I commend a balanced, deeply considered and mature piece of work, commend the authors and editors, and commend it to the general public but, above all, to those who make the grand policy from which grand strategy flows.

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Rethinking Kenya’s War Against Al Shabaab
Diplomacy,Intelligence & Security

Rethinking Kenya’s War Against Al Shabaab examines the diverse issues arising from the installation of the Global War on Terror that was unleashed following the events of 9/11. It takes a broad view of the issues arising especially from the national security perspective of Kenya. The book analyses the validity of characterizing the responses of states as a war. It brings in a fresh perspective of terrorism as conflict, and examines the dominant military responses to the issue, and the ensuing realities that the military response alone was not enough, hence the introduction of Counter Violence Extremism (CVE) as a supporting backbone to the responses. Signally, the book analyses in detail Kenya's strategies in the war on terror, and in an important contribu- tion, analyses in detail the counter violent extremism strategies in Kenya.

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Reviews

Prof. Makumi Mwagiru

In writing Rethinking Kenya’s War Against Al Shabaab, Stephen Gachoki Gichira has made an important contribution to the debates about Kenya’s national security, and especially to the almost ten year war against the Al Shabaab. The debates about the war are shrouded in many controversies about the contemporary international and national security setting. Top amongst these is the idea of a war on terror that was unleashed following the events of 9/11. That declaration of the global war on terror set the international dimensions of responses to 9/11. It also set individual states like Kenya on a path to what now appears to be a war without end, that he notes rightly defies the classical arrangements of war
It is these national security implications for diverse countries that underlie the internal debates about whether individual states should continue the expensive engagements of war, especially asymmetrical wars like Kenya’s war against Al Shabaab. In Kenya’s engagement with Al Shabaab, many issues have arisen and have coloured debates about it ever since its’ beginning in October 2011.
Issues that have arisen include: whether the global war on terror is properly speaking a war; whether the engagement of Kenya in is incursion into Somalia met the requirements of international law, and particularly the international laws of war; whether indeed it followed to the letter the constitutional provisions of war powers in Kenya; whether the military response to terrorism has delivered what it was thought it would deliver; the difficulties of a dual military/counter violence extremism (CVE) can functionally work together and the dynamics of such a dual response; how Kenya’s national security policy making mechanisms have been challenged by the war on terror; and finally, the core question of whether there was a functional exit strategy in Kenya’s incursion into Somalia
The issue of an exit strategy has especially been a difficult one for Kenya. In particular, the re-hatting of the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) to the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) seemed to suggest that the question of an exit strategy had thereby been shifted from Kenya to AMISOM. Indeed the fact that the KDF will exit Somalia in 2021 has been touted as an exemplar of a proper and functional exit strategy for Kenya. However this ending of engagement with AMISOM meant only that the fundamental question of who funds such engagements comes to the fore: should serious matters of the national security of African states be held hostage to foreign donors? Should such engagements not be planned with sustainability in mind, such that the buck stops with African countries and organizations? And indeed, does the return of KDF mean that the war on terror thereby comes to an end, and therefore QED on the vexatious issue of exit strategies? And the nagging question of whether Kenya’s policies and strategies – like the national Strategy to Counter Violent Extremism (NSCVE) have been in sync with the pursuit of its core national interests, or have copy-pasted strategies derived from the UN without reference to the dynamics of Kenya’s operational environment.
In Rethinking Kenya’s War Against Al Shabaab, Stephen Gichira has examined these issues with perspicacity and intellectual discipline. He says in his Preface that his participation in the MA on Diplomacy, Intelligence and Security (MDIS) programme at Strathmore University helped him to “peak” (aka see the light). That may well be so. The redeeming feature of this book is that it has focused its discussions and arguments at the strategic level of national security policy making, as opposed to the operational and tactical levels. It is only at that level of thinking and analysis that the answers to the difficult problems raised by Kenya’s engagement in the war on terror can be deciphered and engaged, and have their backs broken. The book does not pretend to offer strategic solutions that will endure for all time. But it provides answers that relate to the realities of the volatile and dynamic operational environment of Kenya during various periods of the last decade.
That makes the book worth reading. And it is without doubt an excellent examination of the diverse and troublesome issues emerging during the course of that tempestuous decade.

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Intelligence Oversight Mechanisms in EAC States
A Comparative Analysis
Diplomacy,Intelligence & Security

In Intelligence Oversight Mechanisms in EAC States traverses into the fallow African Intelligence Studies [IS] hinterland. It contains an excellent examination of the colonial foundations and early post- independence heritage of Intelligence services in Kenya. It also examines the emergence of intelligence oversight mechanisms during the post-Cold War period. This book also inspects the reasons behind the adoption of intelligence oversight mechanisms in East African Community [EAC] states, and the forces that drove them. Its analyses however suggest that in practice, these exist in name but not in their proper operationalization, and ventures informed analytical reasons why.

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Reviews

Prof. Makumi Mwagiru

In Intelligence Oversight Mechanisms in EAC States, Isaiah Omburo makes a determined traverse into a too long-fallow Intelligence Studies [IS] hinterland. The reasons for the historical stretch remaining in this state of affairs are not far to find. There is a universal tendency for people to shy away from any issues touching on national security services. It seems to be thought that somehow or other, any such engagement is disloyal and unpatriotic. This universal tendency is stretched and entrenched further when the engagement is with the Intelligence Community [IC]. Until, of course there has been a national intelligence failure. Or when ICs have extended their role beyond providing analyses to decision makers to making national security policy. In such cases, as happened in many jurisdictions after the second world war, the structures, organization and budgets are visited with a certain amount of vengeance. They are torn apart, re-modelled, remade, and re-thought.
Beyond this universal tendency, there exist regional differences in approach. States that are not democratic, and new regimes usurping power extra-constitutionally in coups d’etat, reverse the pattern of re-modelling, remaking and re-thinking IC adjustments. Indeed, rather that reforming, they reach back into re-inventing history. They make ICs even more repressive than they were in colonial dark times. They see citizens and legitimate competitors for power as the enemies. And they cushion their recreation of history by baptizing ICs with fancy academic sounding names like Research Bureaus.
Anybody who does not realize this should embark on a geographical educational tour. They should first disembark in 1960s and 1970s Latin America. While there, they should not enjoy the poetry of beautiful game, but reconsider. Thereafter they should obtain visas to visit the Oriental world. While there, they should not imbibe in the poetry and learning and civilization of those lands. They must visit the Shah’s Iran, and Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. From whence, if still a-thirst for empirical evidence, hop to nearby Africa. It is a big continent and they should visit a sample of its many offerings. They can begin with Idi Amin’s Uganda, Bokassa’s CAR, and then apartheid South Africa. By then, their notebooks will surely already be full: of scribblings, and tear-stained recollections of the reasons for the crucifixion. And if still not convinced by the experiences, they should migrate next door, and knock quietly at Isaiah Omburo’s door. And gently borrow his book.
Intelligence Oversight Mechanisms in EAC States is a timely book. It examines the reasons behind oversight of intelligence mechanisms in East African Community [EAC] states. There are six such now, born of the original three. The colonial history of the earlier three could be mistaken for triplets. Not so always of the other three. Thus, Isaiah Omburo’s dream of their colonial historical examination was clearly deeply held, if a little ambitious. He would have required the forum and cover of a three-year doctoral research programme to fully conquer and tame its peak.
But he dared the challenges, as young scholars do. He was wise to do so. In doing so, he flew high over the clouds of the panoply of academic freedom. His examination of the colonial foundations of intelligence in the original EAC region is especially well done, and invigorating. On landing safely from that flight, he has been ushered in as one of Kenyan pioneers in East African – and Kenyan - IS research. He is superseded in circumstance, time and age only by Boinet, whose 2009 paper ushered scholars to the fallow hinterland. His monograph is reminiscent of Prof. Musambayi Katumanga’s seminal 2021 paper on the inheritance of colonial strategic culture in Kenya. This is supported by the history that post-independence intelligence in Kenya was structured around the police force, specifically the Special Branch. Memories of the IC operationalization of that entity are teased in Kibati’s 2016 memoire.
Compared to other EAC states, Kenya’s reforms of the IC seem to belong to other climes and other jurisdictions, like the USA’s immediately post-Second World War revanching of its IC. In Kenya, the true architect of IC reform was Wilson Boinett. He “forced the spring” of the burial of the colonially inherited traditions of the Special Branch by renaming it the National Intelligence Security Service [NISS]. But words are what history says they mean; the hence the word “Security” and its memories still irked deeply. It fell to the reformative Constitution of Kenya, 2010 to change the epistemology of intelligence in Kenya by renaming NISS the National Intelligence Service [NIS].
These epistemological and doctrinal gestalt switches however seemed not touch the face of oversight of intelligence and national security services. At its birth in the EAC region, “oversight” wore a beautiful face like all babies do, and promised to be a joy forever. But after two decades or so, its aspect has developed wrinkles. Its soul is still beautiful to behold, but its legs have walked on bureaucratic thorns. It limps now, because of the reluctance to embrace especially the full promise of parliamentary and judicial oversight. Their voices are strangled by executive control. They now do not rent the air with the pure joy and alluring promise of the first moment of their release.
As Isaiah Omburo points out in Intelligence Oversight Mechanisms in EAC States, they exist in name but not in the fullness of proper operationalization. He ventures informed analytical reasons why. But his ventures fought against the fierce enemy of Time, and its tactics, thriving in academies as in life. Research time does not enjoy pride of place in the period allocated for it in universally demanding Masters level programmes. So it is, and has always been, and forever shall be. Nowhere on earth do those programmes offer space and time to inspect in detail primary documentary support to demonstrate empirically the reasons why operationalizations of good policy are stymied. But dreams are forever. And so, we dream and hope that Omburo will continue to pursue the dream manifested in Intelligence Oversight Mechanisms in EAC States. We pray that with God’s grace he shall embark on a doctoral programme soon, that will tame the tactics of Time. Its portals will open to the vista of all of 36 months in which to harvest the extended beauty of this monograph.
Nevertheless, sincere gratitude and credit is due to Omburo for his daring dreams sowed in the inspiring intellectual contributions of Intelligence Oversight Mechanisms in EAC States. He sowed in the morning, and in so doing has added to the academic – or any other - literature on Intelligence Studies [IS] in Kenya and the region. This monograph is a fitting extension of the hinterland of the domain earlier opened by Boinett. Together their intellectual labours as pioneers in national and regional IS - and with apologies for removing Laurence Binyon’s beautiful and touching 1914 first world war poem out of its physical war context – “shall not grow old…age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.” The war to reclaim the history of IC and other national security services in Kenya, the region and Africa has now properly been joined. It is a war of choice of course, but certainly also of absolute necessity.
The joining now rents the air with the promise of the music of expectation. The pioneers dared to sow in the morning, as they always do. The others will continue the sowing in the afternoon, and in the evening. And then, in the fullness of time, the pleasing cadence of the cry of a newly born African IS shall rent the air.

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