The African Union-European Union (EU) summit that took place in Luanda, Angola, last week underscored a simple truth: The Sahel remains one of Europe’s most urgent security priorities. Yet, even as leaders reaffirmed their commitment to the region, there remains little consensus on what should be done in the face of repeated coups and ongoing insurgent gains there. In this context, understanding the true history of the Sahel’s rapid unraveling is crucial to determining how Europe could contribute to its stabilization going forward.
As jihadi fighters threaten Mali’s capital, Bamako, some critics have argued that France bears chief responsibility for the situation in the Sahel. Paris, they claim, pursued a militarized, neocolonial policy that ignored political questions of governance and legitimacy, thereby inadvertently fueling insurgent violence.
The African Union-European Union (EU) summit that took place in Luanda, Angola, last week underscored a simple truth: The Sahel remains one of Europe’s most urgent security priorities. Yet, even as leaders reaffirmed their commitment to the region, there remains little consensus on what should be done in the face of repeated coups and ongoing insurgent gains there. In this context, understanding the true history of the Sahel’s rapid unraveling is crucial to determining how Europe could contribute to its stabilization going forward.
As jihadi fighters threaten Mali’s capital, Bamako, some critics have argued that France bears chief responsibility for the situation in the Sahel. Paris, they claim, pursued a militarized, neocolonial policy that ignored political questions of governance and legitimacy, thereby inadvertently fueling insurgent violence.
France’s policies should not be immune from criticism. But the reality is that French policymakers were very much attuned to these questions. Indeed, this was why Paris repeatedly called on its European and global partners for support, in the hopes that a larger, better-resourced mission could pursue a more comprehensive strategy. However, when support did not arrive rapidly enough, France was forced to act alone and deploy the resources it could to address the most urgent security needs.
Simply pointing the finger at France is no substitute for real policy. Durable solutions will come only from African leadership supported by consistent, coordinated engagement from European and other partners.
France’s military engagement in the Sahel did not stem from a bid for influence but responded to direct requests from the region’s governments. In January 2013, Mali formally asked Paris for assistance against advancing jihadist forces. The result was Operation Serval, which rapidly recaptured the Malian cities of Gao, Timbuktu, and Kidal and prevented a collapse of the Malian state. Over the subsequent decade, France lost more than 50 soldiers in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger—a heavy price for a mission undertaken largely to secure major cities and restore territorial control.
Despite frequent claims that it focused narrowly on counterterrorism, France recognized early on that stabilization required more than military action. In July 2017, together with Germany and the EU, it launched the Sahel Alliance, a platform to coordinate governance, development, and service-delivery efforts. At the same time, France consistently pushed for shared responsibility: It urged European partners, the United States, and others to contribute resources and championed regional ownership through the G5 Sahel Joint Force. Far from acting alone, France tried to anchor the Sahel response in a broader coalition that linked military tools with political and development strategies. While doing so, it also sought deeper engagement from the Sahelian governments themselves.
France delivered real tactical successes in Mali even as the state’s deeper political foundations remained fragile. The follow-on mission to Operation Serval, Operation Barkhane (2014-22), held the line for nearly a decade in some of the world’s hardest terrain, but it gradually lost political traction. However, to claim, as some critics have, that France’s efforts helped enable the jihadists’ return inverts cause and effect. The state’s collapse came after Mali’s coups, the expulsion of French troops and United Nations peacekeepers altogether, and a shift towards new, less accountable partners.
When France withdrew its last soldiers from Mali in late 2022, it left behind an uneasy stalemate—not peace, but not total collapse either. Since then, violence has worsened. A 2024 snapshot of the region from Armed Conflict Location and Event Data shows Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger experiencing among the highest rates of terrorism-related casualties worldwide. That surge began under the juntas that denounced Paris, not during the period of French involvement. If France’s presence was the problem, the region should be safer by now. It isn’t.
Paris’s intervention never aimed to rebuild Bamako from the ground up. It was a counterterrorism mission trying to buy time for local politics to recover. What followed—corruption, stalled decentralization, and an alienated northern population—is less the failure of France than of the Malian state.
It is fashionable to denounce French “neocolonialism,” but this obscures the evolution of policy. Over time, France shifted from unilateral operations to joint command structures with G5 Sahel partners and expanded EU training missions. What’s more, had France been intent on neocolonial control, it would not have accepted—at considerable military and political cost—local governments whose choices often undermined French operational interests.
The real question is no longer what France should have done differently, but what Europe is prepared to do now. For years, most Europeans tended to consider the Sahel France’s almost exclusive responsibility. That illusion has evaporated. The Sahel today is a crucible of state failure; insurgent innovation; and geopolitical competition involving Russia, Turkey, and Gulf actors, all operating with fewer constraints than Western partners ever tolerated. If Europe wants stability on its southern flank, it cannot outsource strategy.
If the Sahel is slipping away, it is also because Europe never truly acted with enough determination and coordination in the region. For nearly a decade, France shouldered the bulk of the military, financial, and reputational burden for stabilizing a region whose collapse would inevitably affect the whole of Europe. True, other partners contributed, in particular under the umbrella of the EU Common Security and Defence Policy missions, such as the EU training and capacity building missions in Mali (EUTM Mali and EUCAP Sahel Mali). But although they contributed training missions, civilian advisors, and intermittent budget support, it was rarely at a scale or duration that matched the challenge. When conditions worsened, Paris became the convenient scapegoat.
What we must draw from this experience is not a morality tale about French overreach, but a lesson about collective underinvestment. The Sahel exposed structural weaknesses at the core of European foreign and security policy: fragmented decision-making, uneven risk sharing, and the absence of a shared vision. Without remedying those problems, even the most committed member state will exhaust itself.
Today, a credible European approach should begin with restoring civilian protection as the central organizing principle of any support package. Evidence across multiple conflicts shows that abuses by state forces drive extremist group recruitment more effectively than any ideological appeal. Europe must condition its cooperation—diplomatic, financial, military—on clear standards for good conduct and consequences for non-compliance. This is not a moral luxury but a strategic necessity.
Second, Europe must invest in governance where it still exists. Even small pockets of functional administration—from border posts to municipal services—can anchor stability. The reflex to pour resources into high-profile missions while underfunding local governance has repeatedly failed. A more effective model would concentrate support in relatively stable zones, helping them become islands of functional statehood capable of resisting extremist penetration.
Third, cross-border cooperation must stop being a slogan and become an operational reality. The Accra Initiative, linking coastal states with their Sahelian neighbors, offers one of the few viable platforms for joint planning, intelligence sharing, and border control. It deserves predictable European financing more than fragmented project-based support.
Fourth, Europe needs to rethink its security instruments. Despite years of rhetoric, the continent has no deployable, integrated force able to stabilize crises at speed. The ad-hoc Takuba Task Force in Mali hinted at what could be possible—modular, multinational units with shared logistics and interoperable command. Europe should draw lessons from Takuba to develop a standing EU rapid-response capacity that can be activated without months of political wrangling. In this regard, the EU’s new Rapid Deployment Capacity—with 5,000 troops able to deploy rapidly wherever a crisis emerges—is a step in the right direction.
Finally, Europe must speak with a strong coordinated political voice. Although all EU member states have individually condemned the coups in the Sahel, a unified European position linking political transition, human rights standards, and access to development financing would wield far more influence.
If Europe truly believes instability in the Sahel threatens its own security—through migration pressures, trafficking networks, and extremist spillover—then it must build a collective architecture capable of acting early, decisively, and coherently. Predictable funding for African-led peace operations and sustained governance programs would be a start.
France’s experience in the Sahel should not be treated as a cautionary tale against engagement. It should be the blueprint for a simple lesson: No European nation should ever be left to carry such a burden alone.
