In the image
French troops in the Sahel during Operation ‘Barkhane’, in 2020 [Armée Française]
The early 2020s witnessed a dramatic French retreat across the Sahel. One by one, Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger—once key pillars of France’s regional counterterrorism alliance—have severed military ties with Paris and expelled its forces. Even Chad, formerly a steadfast ally, saw French troops depart. French military presence in the Sahel has been whittled down to virtually nil, aside from a handful of personnel in places like Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire, or Djibouti, that lie on the periphery.
France’s military role in the Sahel goes back to the era of decolonization and the subsequent decades of Françafrique, during which Paris frequently intervened in its former African colonies to protect strategic interests and prop up allied regimes. In the post-independence period of the 1960s and 70s, France maintained defense agreements and a network of bases across West and Central Africa. This included deployments in Chad (notably Opération ‘Épervier’ from 1986) and intermittent military assistance to regional governments. These early interventions set the stage for France’s later counterterrorism campaigns.
The current phase of French engagement began in 2013, when France launched Operation ‘Serval’ in Mali at the Malian government’s request, halting a jihadist insurgents’ march toward Bamako. Operation ‘Serval’ successfully pushed armed groups (linked to Al-Qaeda) back from Mali’s northern cities. In 2014, this mission expanded into Operation ‘Barkhane’, a long-term counterterrorism deployment across five Sahelian countries—Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Chad, and Mauritania—with roughly 5,000 French troops at its height.
Post-2020 upheaval: Coups, withdrawals, and reversals
The post-2020 period marked a turning point for France’s military presence in the Sahel. A series of military coups in Mali, Chad, Burkina Faso, and Niger dramatically altered France’s role. In August 2020, Mali’s elected president was overthrown, beginning Mali’s slide away from its French security partnership. A second coup in Bamako in May 2021 brought Colonel Assimi Goïta to power and further soured relations. France, which had pressured the junta for a quick return to civilian rule, found itself at odds with Mali’s new leaders
Tensions peaked as the Malian regime invited Russian private military contractors (the Wagner Group) as new partners. Amid this rift—and faced with persistent jihadist violence that showed no sign of abating—President Emmanuel Macron announced a major drawdown of forces. He declared the end of Operation ‘Barkhane’ as a “external operation” in mid-2021, foreshadowing a “profound transformation” of France’s presence in the Sahel.
A similar pattern soon unfolded in neighboring countries. In Burkina Faso, a coup in January 2022 brought a military junta to power, followed by a second coup in October 2022 installing Captain Ibrahim Traoré. Initially, France’s 400-strong special forces unit (Operation ‘Sabre’) continued to operate from Ouagadougou against jihadists spilling over from Mali.
Niger, long considered France’s last reliable Sahel anchor, delivered the final blow to Paris’s regional strategy. France had repositioned roughly 1,500 troops to Niger after the Mali departure. Yet in July, 2023, the government of Niger was itself toppled in a coup d’état, ousting President Bazoum The new military junta in Niamey immediately adopted a defiant anti-French posture. This was a strategic nightmare for Paris: the last major foothold in the Sahel had fallen. Macron’s government at first refused to recognize the Nigerien juntaand supported West African (ECOWAS) threats to intervene militarily to restore Bazoum.
France’s special relationships with more stable partners began to deteriorate, compounding existing setbacks. In Chad, which hosts France’s regional headquarters in N’Djamena and has historically been crucial to France’s Sahel strategy, an unexpected shift occurred between 2021 and 2024. Chad's longtime ruler, Idriss Déby, a close ally of France, died in battle in 2021 and was succeeded by his son in a ‘dynastic’ transition; amid a growing anti-French sentiment and Chad’s internal challenges, the partnership began to weaken. By January 2025, France officially ended its military presence in Chad by relinquishing its last military base, marking the conclusion of a continuous French troop presence that had begun with Chad’s independence in 1960.
Geopolitical and strategic motivations behind the drawdown
Multiple intertwined factors explain why France’s once robust engagement in the Sahel has faltered. Anti-French sentiment in the region is a leader among them. After years of military operations, many Sahelian communities saw little improvement in security, while civilian casualties and military incidents accumulated. The resentment towards the former colonial power became more vocal, with protests occurring in Bamako, Ouagadougou, and Niamey. Demonstrators displayed placards demanding, “France go home.” This public discontent was further amplified by local politicians and coup leaders, who found a convenient scapegoat in France for the ongoing instability in the region.
The massive protests just contributed to a worsened strategic environment: France was investing substantial resources but seeing diminishing returns, while local partners were either overthrown, unreliable, or openly hostile. A consensus emerged in Paris that the ‘Barkhane’ mission, as it was originally conceived, had reached its limits. The Sahel mission was costly in terms of both lives and finances. Over the years, dozens of Frenchsoldiers lost their lives, and the financial burden of maintaining thousands of troops abroad—along with advanced equipment and logistics—grew to hundreds of millions of euros annually. Initially, French public opinion was supportive in 2013; however, by 2021, a majority of citizens viewed the intervention as a futile burden.
Shifting regional alliances and the growing footprint of other powers also heavily influenced France’s drawdown. In the vacuum left by departing French troops, Russia has eagerly stepped in as a partner for embattled Sahel regimes. The ‘Africa Corps’ group, formerly known as the Wagner Group, a Kremlin-linked private military company, deployed mercenaries to Mali soon after France’s departure. Africa Corps contractors now assist Mali’s army, and signs of a similar Russian presence have been observed in Central African Republic and, reportedly, in Burkina Faso by late 2023. As of 2025, the Wagner Group's presence is confirmed in Burkina Faso, Central African Republic Niger, Mali and Sudan.
This Russian involvement comes packaged with arms supplies, propaganda support, and promises of regime protection—a stark alternative to France’s more conditional aid that often insisted on democratic norms. For Mali’s and Burkina Faso’s juntas, aligning with Moscow offered not only military assistance but also a symbolic rejection of France’s influence. The geopolitical subtext is a contest for influence: Russia seizes an opportunity to displace France in its traditional sphere, capitalizing on post-colonial grudges. Apart from filling the gap that the French withdrawal leaves behind, Russia also seeks access to gold, uranium, and other valuable natural resources in the region.
Meanwhile, China’s role, though more economic than military, has also grown in the Sahel (from infrastructure investments to mining deals), subtly undermining France’s once-dominant position in trade and development assistance. China’s role will grow to a never-before-seen scale, taking into account that multiple Sahelian nations, such as Chad, Niger, and Mali, have joined the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).
Another core motivation for the drawdown is the intractable nature of the jihadist insurgencies themselves and the strategic impasse France confronted after years of fighting. Despite tactical victories—such as killing leaders of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM)—the insurgencies in Mali and its neighboring states have expanded rather than diminished. Islamist militant groups skillfully exploited local grievances and the vast, ungoverned rural areas of the Sahel, spreading violence further south. France’s counterterrorism mission began to resemble a ‘forever war’ with no clear exit strategy in sight. By 2021, French officials were openly questioning whether a purely military approach could succeed in a desert region of 4 million square kilometers that was plagued by illicit trafficking and fragile governments.
France’s future strategy: Full withdrawal or minimal presence?
Now, when French troops are gone from Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and even Chad, one might conclude that the retreat suggests that the notion of “lasting commitment” to Sahelian security has turned into a “distant fantasy.” The French government insists it remains committed to fighting terrorism in the Sahel “with all willing partners,” though through different means. What does it mean in practice?
First, France appears poised to maintain a minimal military presence through a network of smaller deployments and rapid reaction capabilities. Even as large-scale operations ended, French officials spoke of retaining “hundreds” of counterterrorism specialists in the broader region (for example, in Niger before the coup, and in neighboring states). The idea was to shift from unilateral operations to a supporting role—providing intelligence, drones, and special forces ‘over-the-horizon’ support to local armies fighting jihadists. For instance, after pulling out of Mali, France concentrated forces in Niger’s Niamey air base with ‘Reaper’ drones and ‘Mirage’ fighter jets, aiming to strike militant targets regionally if needed.
Second, France is doubling down on multilateral and African-led security initiatives to stay indirectly engaged. With the demise of the France-driven G5 Sahel Joint Force (Mali, Niger, and Burkina have all quit the alliance), attention has shifted to new frameworks. France has voiced support for the Accra Initiative, a West African-led effort coordinating Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire, Benin, and others to prevent the southward spread of Sahelian militants. Paris can provide training, funding, and equipment to such regional forces without taking the lead role. Similarly, France is likely to continue backing UN peacekeeping—though Mali’s junta forced the UN’s MINUSMA mission to terminate in 2023. By positioning itself as a partner behind the scenes, France hopes to avoid the visibility while still safeguarding its interests (e.g., preventing Sahel-based terror groups from threatening French interests or plotting attacks in Europe).
A crossroads
In conclusion, France’s military presence in the Sahel stands at a crossroads between persistence and withdrawal. Recent developments lean toward the latter: the vision of a long-term French guardian in the Sahel has indeed faded, undercut by coup-led governments asserting their autonomy and by great-power competition reshaping allegiances. If a “lasting commitment” means a sustained, large-scale deployment, that prospect has dimmed considerably—arguably becoming a “distant fantasy.” However, if commitment is measured in continued engagement of any form, France is likely to remain involved in a pared-down way, seeking to salvage influence without reigniting the backlash.
The withdrawal of French forces, particularly from Mali and the broader Sahel region, created a strategic vacuum that Russia quickly moved to fill through the Wagner Group. This shift weakened Western influence in the region and allowed Russia to position itself as an alternative security partner, often offering unconditional support in exchange for access to natural resources. The EU, closely tied to France’s missions, also lost ground, diminishing its role in shaping local governance, counterterrorism strategy, and democratic norms. This not only undermines Western leverage in Africa but also strengthens authoritarian trends aligned with Moscow’s interests.
The final verdict may depend on how the security situation evolves. A worsening crisis could prompt France to re-engage, while a persistent trend of nationalist governance might solidify its withdrawal. Currently, France’s exit speaks volumes, serving as a humbling reminder that military power alone cannot ensure influence. The future security arrangements in the Sahel are being reshaped, and France, reflecting on recent experiences, will need to adapt if it wants to avoid its previous commitment becoming merely a footnote in history.