British defense engagement and defense advisers in Kenya after independence

In 2017, the British Ministry of Defence (MOD) and Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) published the ‘UK’s International Defence Engagement Strategy’. The strategy highlights the importance of overseas students training in British military academies, conducting British training exercises overseas, exports of defence equipment, having access and exercising influence. Defence Attachés play a key role in this, forming a ‘global network’ to organise defence engagement.[i] Despite being presented as ‘a step-change in our approach’,[ii] the policies advocated are in fact reminiscent of previous policies and strategies adopted by the two departments. This can clearly be seen in the case of Kenya in the decades after her independence from the British Empire in 1963. All of the above were the priorities in the defence relationship with Kenya that the British government and military pursued after independence. [...]