Political analyst Prof Mutahi Ngunyi has defended Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) soldiers over criticism for allegedly hiding during Manda Bay Airstrip terrorist attack.
The New York Times on Wednesday reported that KDF soldiers 'hid in the grass' when Al-Shabaab militants raided the airstrip leaving three Americans dead.
Following the reports, vocal lawyer Donald Kipkorir opined the soldiers were guilty of cowardice and deserved to be court-martialled and be jailed.
"Under the Kenya Defence Act, running away from the enemy or leaving your station when attacked is cowardice and the penalty is life imprisonment .. If the New York Times story is true, those KDF cowards of Manda, Lamu have no choice," he tweeted.
Ngunyi, however, defended the soldiers saying hiding was not an act of cowardice, but was a tactical withdrawal upon realisation the enemy was too powerful.
"In combat, you have state absence and state abstinence. What KDF did by hiding in the grass was state abstinence, not absence or cowardice. When you are overpowered you abstain. Only a fool will fight a biggerr bully! Read a book Kip!" he said.
In a rejoinder, Kipkorir stood his ground insisting he was well informed about military operations, and no where cowardice was ever considered as a strategy.
"Prof, I have read books by the World’s greatest military theorists from Carl von Clausewitz to Sun Tzu and none of them has cowardice as a strategy .... But I haven’t read and will not read any book on war by the Canadian Kenyan General if that is what you want me to read," he said in reference to exiled lawyer Miguna Miguna, the self-declared 'General' of National Resistance Movement (NRM).