Have the French lost Africa?

France’s proposed drawdown of troops from Mali may not be comparable to defeat in Vietnam and Algeria, but it is recognition that eight years after going in to stabilise the Sahel, its strategy is failing. Indeed, French influence in the wider Francophone Africa region is under threat.

Earlier this month President Macron responded to the second military coup in Mali in less than a year by announcing a “profound transformation” of his country’s military operations in the region. The reality may not be as profound as his statement was meant to sound to a domestic public increasingly sceptical about the wisdom of staying the course. France is stuck in the sands and scrubland of this vast area, fed up with fighting, anxious for help, but knows that for now a full retreat is impossible.

There are 5,100 French troops fighting in the Sahel as part of “Operation Barkhane”, named after a crescent-shaped sand dune found in the region. Most are based in Mali with others operating in Chad, Niger, Mauritania, and Burkina Faso. Macron now wants to reduce that number and replace Barkhane with “an international alliance, associating countries in the region with all our partners, strictly limited to the fight against terrorism”. The response from the partners has been “You and whose army? Not ours.”

The President’s call for extra troops from Europeans is undermined by the fact that he’s trying to withdraw many of his own forces. His comment that the Americans would be “welcome” to add special forces to the fight comes at a time when President Biden is trying to get out of Afghanistan and is telling the Europeans they need to do a lot more in their own backyard. The Sahel is a second or even third tier issue for the Americans and the new administration has yet to appoint a special envoy to the region. Macron’s insistence that the military rulers in Mali and Chad do more to fight Islamist-led insurgencies will fall on deaf ears if the leaders conclude that in the long run, they may have to share power with the insurgents (see Afghanistan for details). The French also want to enlarge the 13,000-strong UN peacekeeping force, but the US is concerned it would entangle the force in a counterterrorism operation it is not trained to fight.

So the cavalry is not about to come charging over the hill. Yet neither are the French about to go home. Macron will draw down some troops; after all, he faces an election campaign next year, but France can hardly risk several countries in the Sahel collapsing and sending waves of refugees into North Africa and on to Europe. Instead, it seems likely it will just try and hold the line, deploy fewer troops, rely on drones and special forces, and hope the mission to train local forces to take over operations bears fruit (again, see Afghanistan for details…). Thousands of people are being killed each year and the security forces of the Sahelian countries cannot protect their own people. Just this month gunmen stormed a village in northern Burkina Faso and killed at least 130 people.

In a bid to limit the killing, the few dozen Czech and Estonian special forces will stay on, as will the Swedish, Danish and British helicopter support, along with 300 or so British ground troops. The Americans are expected to maintain the 1,000 or so military personnel they have in the region and continue to supply satellite and drone intelligence to the French. This is vital in an area bigger than Europe. What most will not do is to plug any gaps left by the French. Given that the situation is getting worse not better, those gaps leave an opportunity for other outside actors.

Enter Russia. Moscow may have had a hand in the recent Mali coup, and Russia has signed military agreements with several Sahelian countries. This week ten tourists were arrested in Chad. Nine are Russian and one is Lithuanian. All are being questioned by Chadian intelligence for suspected links to the private Russian mercenary company Wagner Group which was heavily involved in fighting in Libya last year. The Russian government has relations with Chadian insurgents and the Wagner Group is a handy vehicle by which Moscow could assist the insurgency whilst maintaining “plausible deniability”. If that is the case it gives Russia a platform to challenge French interests in the region.

Just below Chad is the Central African Republic, a former French colony where France has 300 soldiers. At the beginning of June France suspended aid and military cooperation accusing the government of being complicit in “massive disinformation campaigns” against France. The suspicion is that the campaigns were orchestrated by Moscow which late last year sent hundreds of military instructors to train government soldiers in their fight against rebel groups. There are numerous but unconfirmed reports that among them were mercenaries from the Wagner Group who participated in fighting the rebels.

France has troops in eight African countries and business interests in many more. Maintaining influence is costly – more than 50 French troops have been killed in the Sahel and Operation Barkhane has cost $600 million per year. The Russians know France is tired of its own “forever war” and is vulnerable throughout the francophone region. They will try and wear down the French, the French will try and counter. It is going to be a real test of commitment.