Africa-Press – Kenya. Kenya’s naval forces under the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) are participating in Exercise Cutlass Express 2026, a major multinational maritime security drill sponsored by the United States Africa Command (AFRICOM), as the country steps up efforts to secure its coastline and protect key Indian Ocean trade routes.
The exercise, running from February 2 to 12 and hosted in Port Louis, Mauritius, brings together the KDF through the Kenya Navy, alongside regional and global partners, to strengthen maritime law enforcement and naval cooperation.
For Kenya, the drill’s focus is primarily on enhancing the Navy’s ability to counter unlawful fishing, smuggling, piracy, and other unlawful maritime activities that threaten the country’s Exclusive Economic Zone and coastal economy, including operations linked to the ports of Mombasa and Lamu.
Kenyan forces are training alongside the United States Navy, particularly the U.S. Sixth Fleet, in complex operations such as visit, board, search, and seizure (VBSS); maritime interdiction; and coordinated patrols aimed at disrupting illicit networks operating at sea.
The exercise, according to the organisers, will sharpen Kenya’s as well as other participating nations’ maritime domain awareness and allow naval officers to improve surveillance.
At the same time, the exercise will enable them to gain expertise in information sharing and real-time response to suspicious vessel movements in the Western Indian Ocean.
A key feature of Cutlass Express 2026 is the deployment of unmanned and autonomous systems by U.S. Task Force 66, exposing Kenyan naval personnel to advanced technologies used to detect and deter unlawful activity across vast maritime spaces.
Beyond Kenya, the exercise includes 19 participating nations, among them Somalia, Tanzania, Seychelles, Djibouti, Egypt, India, France, the United Kingdom, Mozambique, Senegal, and the United States.
“Cutlass Express is a cornerstone of maritime security and cooperation in the strategic waters of the East African coast and the Western Indian Ocean,” J. T. Anderson, who is the Vice Adm. commander, U.S. 6th Fleet, said.
Adding that, “The more we operate with our partners in this critical region, the more we enhance interoperability and achieve our combined maritime security goals. Exercises like Cutlass Express ensure freedom of navigation, bolster maritime domain awareness, and strengthen naval readiness to counter malign activity.”
Kenya and the U.S. have maintained a major defence partnership for years, which mainly focused on regional stability and peacekeeping missions. Still, recently, the partnership has gone further to concentrate also on infrastructure expansion.
The two countries recently broke ground on an Ksh8.9 billion runway expansion at the Manda Bay naval base in Lamu County. This project seeks to double the runway length and enable it to support rapid response to security threats in the area.
Meanwhile, these developments come against the backdrop of a recent visit to Nairobi by Christopher Landau, the U.S. Deputy Secretary of State, who was accompanied by General Dagvin R. M. Anderson, Commander of U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM).
During the visit, they met with President William Ruto and other Kenyan officials to discuss bilateral cooperation on security, regional stability, and trade.
