(Photo by Magharebia via Flickr/CC BY 2.0 DEED)
On Saturday, April 25th 2026, two Malian opposition groups executed coordinated attacks across the African nation. They managed to kill the defence minister, Sadio Camara, and imposed a crushing siege on the capital, Bamako. Worryingly for Mali, this is the first time Jamaʿat Nuṣrat al-Islām wa-l Muslimīn (JNIM) and the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA)— the two main armed opposition groups — have joined forces.
This is indeed a strange pairing, as JNIM is an al-Qaeda-linked jihadi group intent on spreading its hardline conservative Islamist vision across the Sahara and Sahel. JNIM came out of a merger of four al-Qaeda-allied groups: Ansar Dine, AQIM, Katina Macina, and al-Mourabitoun. The FLA is a Tuareg self-determination movement based in north Mali.
The FLA has existed in some form since the 1900s, advocating for an independent Tuareg state. The Tuareg are a nomadic Amazigh group Indigenous to the Sahara and Sahel. The FLA’s predecessors rebelled twice against the Malian government, in the 1960s and 1990s, failing both times.
JNIM and the FLA had been at each other’s throats for several years due to their diverging ideologies. JNIM uses extreme violence, hoping to establish a Salafi Caliphate, while the FLA seeks to establish a legitimate independent state. They only joined forces because the Malian government is weak and in disarray. Their joint rebellion will likely last until one group sees the other as a bigger threat than the government.
Corruption Corrodes
This most recent uprising dates back to March 2012, when, after two decades of inept and corrupt civilian leadership, the country saw its third military coup in 52 years of independence. The coup came amidst economic disarray and Tuareg and Islamist fighters capturing northern territory.
Captain Amadou Haya Sanogo executed the coup weeks before the April presidential elections. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) — a bloc of 15 West African countries, of which Mali was a member — immediately sanctioned Mali. The U.S. and France followed suit. Shortly after, Sanogo agreed to a deal with ECOWAS to remove the sanctions in return for appointing a civilian interim president and organizing new elections.
Despite the nominal transfer of power, the military largely remained in power. Initially, Mali’s government rejected any foreign intervention, only accepting logistical help with combatting the northern fighters. However, after nine months of mounting losses, in December 2012, Mali requested a United Nations peacekeeping force and a French military intervention.
The Empire Returns
France’s military returned to Mali in January 2013, nearly 53 years after they ended their colonization. French troops immediately initiated their counterinsurgent Operation Serval. The French initially saw success. They quickly retook the north and brought it back under the Malian government control.
France’s overwhelming firepower, military discipline, experience and, most importantly, an identifiable enemy holding territory enabled the swift victory. However, after this loss, the Islamist fighters did not lay down their weapons. They adapted.
The fighters dispersed across the Sahel and embedded themselves in preexisting local conflicts. These actions forced the French to react in turn. In August 2014, France officially ended Operation Serval and started Operation Barkhane.
(Photo by TM1972 via Wikimedia Commons/CC BY-SA 4.0 DEED)
Operation Barkhane was much larger in scope than Serval, covering Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Chad. France also maintained the previous counterterrorist strategy of killing jihadi leaders, even though they had now embedded themselves in civilian areas.
France failed to adapt to the fighter’s switch in strategy. They continued to use overwhelming force, rather than isolating the fighters and resolving the local conflicts the Islamists sought to exacerbate. France also failed to reign in the Malian army they were training. In 2020, the Malian army killed more civilians than the jihadis.
A Familiar Pattern
France’s operations share a similar pattern with the other instances of imperial intervention. Just like the French, the U.S.-led coalitions in Iraq and Afghanistan saw initial success. The U.S. defeated the Taliban in two months and Iraq’s army in 26 days.
France, just like the U.S. in Vietnam, was highly effective at killing “enemy combatants.” In both cases, the intervening power also killed swaths of civilians, causing the local population to turn against them.
The French, just like the Soviets in Afghanistan, only had control of the urban areas, and not the rural areas where the jihadis were. Just like all the others, France faced a humiliating retreat.
France’s use of force and inability to adapt to the evolving conditions turned the local population against it. France’s intervention, in fact, did not quell violence. It rose under their watch. The U.N. estimated over 2.1 million displaced people during the duration of France’s nine-year intervention. France, just like the other imperial powers, did not reduce the violence; it increased it.
Growing Discontent
France’s inability to manage the situation and keep the peace led to waves of large demonstrations across Mali. While there was substantial anti-France sentiment across the country, most protests were aimed at the President, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who failed to ease the protestors’ anger. The military sensed an opportunity and removed him from office.
Initially, the coup plotters stated that they only sought to maintain power for a year until a newly elected government could take shape. Despite the anti-French sentiment, the Junta maintained their military presence.
(Photo by Magharebia via Wikimedia Commons/CC BY 2.0 DEED)
However, when France killed 19 people on January 3rd, 2021, after mistaking a wedding for a terrorist gathering, anger towards France reached untenable levels. In May 2021, two months after a U.N. report confirmed the incident, a group within the ruling Junta executed a second coup.
Colonel Assimi Goïta led the second coup and became the head of government. As he gained power, he employed more aggressive and grandiose language. He spoke of revolution, sovereignty, pan-Africanism, and fighting Western imperialism. This rhetoric made him and the new Junta extremely popular with the Malian people.
Au Revoir La France
As Goïta and most Malians grew frustrated with France, he invited the Wagner group — the Russian paramilitary mercenary group — to provide security and logistical support to Malian troops. This move enraged France and further strained what were already tense relations. Later in 2021, Mali asked France to remove all its forces.
All these converging factors led Emmanuel Macron, France’s president, to withdraw all French troops from Mali on August 15th, 2022. After nearly a decade, French troops left Mali in a similar — or even worse — state than they had found it, just as the U.S. did when it left Afghanistan a year earlier.
When France arrived there was an armed Islamist insurrection and a Tuareg rebellion in the country’s north, and Mali had just suffered a coup. As France left nine years later, they had managed to ease the Tuareg rebellion. However, the jihadis were still active, and the conflict was even more violent than when France arrived.
Different Country, Same Result
Just like the majority of imperial interventions, France’s intervention in Mali ended in defeat. What made the defeat humiliating was that Mali was replacing it with Russia, its major geopolitical adversary. Russia immediately seized on this opportunity and employed Goïta’s anti-Western language and sought to portray itself as part of an anti-Western axis that would support Africa.
However, Russian presence and interest in Mali were not so well-intentioned. In exchange for Malian natural resources, especially minerals, Russia would essentially play the same role France did. At first, Russia and its Wagner group had success in Mali, mirroring the pattern of imperial intervention.
(Photo by the Kremlin via Wikimedia Commons/CC BY 4.0 DEED)
In November 2023, Wagner secured Kidal, a key northern town, from Tuareg rebels.A feat which the French were not able to achieve. Despite this success, Russia faced disaster even more quickly and forcefully than the French.
Further Violence and Turmoil
Russia and their Malian counterparts were even more violent than the French were. Just like France, they killed more than the jihadis did, but on a larger scale. Russia’s problems worsened when Wagner’s leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin, launched a coup against Putin and eventually died under suspicious circumstances.
After Prigozhin’s death, the Russian Ministry of Defence seized control of the Wagner Group and renamed its operations in Africa to the Africa Corps. This name change did little to change the situation on the ground. Russia continued to lose men and equipment at a high rate.
Before the latest rebel offensive, Russia had already lost over 15 advanced aircraft. Simply put, Russia is not able to sustain its position, let alone maintain the Malian Junta’s stability. Russia resorted to the old Soviet playbook in Afghanistan of attacking, torturing, and killing villagers in rebel strongholds.
Rebels Rising
This strategy proved to be as ineffective as it was 40years ago. Russia is arguably more unpopular than the French were. Russia’s position is also weaker than the French one was. After the coordinated rebel offensive, the FLA is now demanding that Russia withdraw all its forces from Mali.
It seems Russia’s intervention has been so disastrous that the Tuareg rebels are asserting more sovereignty than the Malian central government. Just like in other imperial interventions, the foreign power’s presence weakens the host country’s government. The coordinated attack marked a low point for Russia and the Malian government, because the FLA states that they coordinated the Russian surrender and withdrawal from the north.
(Photo by Magharebia via Wikimedia Commons/CC BY 2.0 DEED)
Despite the fragility of the FLA and JNIM’s union, it is likely to force Russia to rethink its strategy and presence in the Sahel. The local fighters and insurgents were able to adapt to the changing contexts while the foreign powers seemed unable to do so.
Mali in Crisis
After two failed foreign interventions and a series of military coups, Mali finds itself in a worse situation than when it asked for French help in 2013. The competing rebels have joined forces with the goal of overthrowing the central government and evicting the Russian troops.
Mali is more violent than before. The economic situation is worse. Its vital trade routes are unusable. Jihadis are enforcing a fuel blockade. And it finds itself increasingly isolated on the world stage. Despite the government’s diplomatic isolation, more international players are seeking to get involved in Mali for their benefit.
China is seeking increased access to resources by offering favourable trade and development deals, Turkey is seeking to ingratiate itself as a security partner by selling cheap drones, and Morocco is giving landlocked Mali access to the Atlantic Ocean in exchange for recognizing Moroccan sovereignty over the Western Sahara.
Mali has now become a violent geopolitical chessboard. The increasingly weak central government has to contend with opposition groups that have joined forces to defeat it and an increasingly weak and unreliable foreign security partner. Mali now has to turn to all parties interested in the region to have any chance at staying intact.
Sahel Strained
Sadly, Mali’s situation is not unique. Sahel countries are facing an identical predicament. Burkina Faso, Niger, and Chad also kicked out the French and welcomed the Russians, mirroring the results in Mali. All were rightly dissatisfied with the French presence in their countries, but the Russians proved to be somehow worse.
These situations have turned into a giant collective problem as all the Sahel states are facing increased violence and economic strain. There is a sense that some of these governments, especially Mali, could collapse and give way to an increased jihadi foothold in the region.
Instead of focusing on a solely military approach to the conflict, the Malian government must directly address the Tuareg rebels’ grievances. They have been amenable in the past, when they signed the Algiers Accords in 2015. France and Russia have shown that a violent approach will not bear fruit.
The Malian government has to show its people and the rebels that it is sovereign and free of foreign aid, and willing to help and listen to its citizens. Killing them with outside help has so far not worked.
Edited by Khushi Mehta
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