The Department of Defense announced today the findings of U.S. Africa Command's Army Regulation 15-6 investigation and the Secretary of Defense-directed independent review of events from the Jan. 5, 2020 al-Shabaab attack at the Cooperative Security Location in Manda Bay, Kenya.

Military investigations have found poor leadership, inadequate training and a "culture of complacency” among U.S. forces undermined efforts to fend off a 2020 attack by militants in Kenya that killed three Americans, U.S. officials familiar with the probes told The Associated Press ahead of the release of the findings, expected Thursday.

Two military reviews of the attack by al-Shabab militants are scathing in their conclusions that there were failures across the board at the Manda Bay air base, where senior military leaders said there was a “deeply rooted culture of a false sense of security.” The attack also wounded three people and destroyed six aircraft, and killed at least six insurgents.

Army Gen. Stephen Townsend, head of U.S. Africa Command, which did the first review, told the AP that while the actions of no one person caused the attack or the casualties, the reviews concluded that security, intelligence, training and command failures contributed to the losses.
And Air Force Maj. Gen. Tom Wilcox, who was part of the team that did the second review, said that “none of the negligence that we found contributed to the primary cause of the loss of life or damage. However, we did find that they potentially contributed to the outcome, to vulnerabilities on the airfield.”

Defense officials said that a number of Air Force personnel were reviewed for possible disciplinary action and, as a result, eight have received some form of administrative punishment, including written reprimands and loss of certification. The eight range from junior enlisted airmen to officers below the general ranks. A written reprimand can be career-ending for an officer. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe personnel discipline.

The Manda Bay base, in the Kenyan seaside resort, was overrun by 30 to 40 of the al-Qaida-linked insurgents on Jan. 5, 2020, marking al-Shabab’s first attack against U.S. forces in the East African country. The pre-dawn assault triggered a lengthy firefight and daylong struggle for U.S. and Kenyan forces to search and secure the base.

The initial investigation into the attack was completed a year ago by U.S. Africa Command, but last April Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin ordered a new, independent review led by Gen. Paul Funk, commander of Army Training and Doctrine Command.

The new report largely mirrors the findings in the initial probe but expands its scope. Both are sharply critical of the inadequate security, training and oversight at the base. Austin has accepted the reports and their findings.

The base at Manda Bay has been used for years by the U.S. military, but it only became a full-time airfield in 2016, with increased personnel, aircraft and operations. According to the reviews, the military there never adjusted security to account for the expanded use and was lulled by the fact the base hadn’t been attacked in 16 years.

The complacency, said the Africom review, permeated every echelon and existed for several years.

The reviews criticized leadership at all levels, from the Air Force wing and security forces to special operations commanders and U.S. Africa Command. They found there was an inadequate understanding of and focus on the threats in the region.

Townsend said a vague intelligence report prior to the deadly attack referred to al-Shabab planning to attack United Nations aircraft. But that report didn't get to the right people due to staff shortages, And, he said, those who saw it “didn't connect the dots” — that it could be referring to the unmarked contract aircraft the U.S. has at Manda Bay.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin directed the independent review to provide added insight, perspective, and the ability to assess the totality of this event involving multiple military services and Department of Defense Components.

The four-star general-led independent review concurred with all of the recommendations from the AR 15-6 investigation conducted by U.S. Africa Command. Secretary Austin accepted the findings and recommendations of the independent review.

Both the AR 15-6 investigation and the independent review found the proximate cause of the loss of life and damage to property was the attack by a massed force of 30 to 40 determined, disciplined, and well-resourced al-Shabaab fighters.

The investigation and independent review further found that no single point of failure resulted in the loss of life and damage to property, and no single act or omission would have avoided the attack. However, several causal factors contributed to the attack, including inadequate force protection focus, inadequate understanding of the threat, inadequate security force preparation, and problems with mission command.

Following the attack, U.S. Africa Command directed a series of measures to improve force protection at all locations on the continent, and continues to implement improvements to force protection, intelligence sharing, security force preparation, and mission command as identified by the 15-6 and independent review.

The attack killed one U.S. Army Soldier, Specialist Henry J. Mayfield, and two U.S. contract personnel, Bruce Triplett and Dustin Harrison. The attack also wounded three additional U.S. personnel and one Kenyan soldier, and destroyed $71.5 million of U.S. government resources.

U.S. forces use CSL Manda Bay to provide training to African partners, respond to crises and protect U.S. interests. U.S. Africa Command assigns responsibility to U.S. Air Forces-Africa for the integration of base support including force protection at CSL Manda Bay.