How Kenya and Uganda compare on Military power; KDF vs UPDF.
This comparison comes after Museveni’s son Muhoozi, who is also the commander of Uganda people’s defence forced,threatened to capture Nairobi in less than two weeks.
Also read Chaos in Twitter over Museveni’son ‘s tweet about Kenya
The tweet has raised a conversation on which military force has more power.
Below is how Kenya and Uganda compare in terms of military power.
Global Fire power
According Global Firepower, which assesses countries’ military strengths; Kenya was ranked 81st out of 142 while Uganda was position 92.
The report added that Uganda has 47,000 active military personnel with an additional 10,000 reservists, while Kenya has 24,000 with no reserves.
Kenya’s paramilitary forces ranks at 5,000 compared with Uganda’s 1,500.
Air power
Kenya has total of 17 interceptors, 87 helicopters and 2 attack helicopters for a total air fleet of 151, compared to Uganda who have 10 interceptors, 25 helicopters, and 5 attack helicopters for a total air fleet of 49.
Ground power
According to the Global Firepower website Kenya has 959 armoured vehicles, while Uganda has 1,056.
However, this does not include the 118 new armoured military vehicles that Kenya is acquiring from Turkey in a deal worth Sh9.87 billion.
Finances
Kenya’s purchasing power is rated higher than Uganda’s.
Territorial power
For a long time, Uganda has claimed ownership of parts of Kenya’s 580,367 kilometre square land mass.
This dispute stated the era of the latePresident Idi Amin Dada. He attempted to redraw the boundaries between the two countries in 1976 claimed Turkana, West Pokot, Trans Nzoia to Naivasha.
However, Jomo Kenyatta threatened to block Uganda’s imports through the port of Mombasa, that is when Amin stopped.
In Muhoozi’s tweets he stated,” To all compatriots, fellow country men and women. Uganda and Kenya. I say we must all conquer our fears. These colonial borders must fall!”
In 2019, the foreign affairs CS stated that,”Kenyans must know the territorial integrity of the country will never be negotiated away.”
However, despite this differences, the two countries are sharing security responsibilities in the border.
An example is they co-guard the border in Busia, both are cooperating in peacekeeping missions under the African Union Transition Mission in Somalia (ATMIS) and the United Nations Stabilisation Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Both countries will also soon be deployed to the East African Standby Force (EASF) in the DRC.