[Reflection] The end of major Western external interventions?
(B2) With the withdrawal of French soldiers from Mali, a cycle of external operations begun in the 2000s in Iraq, Afghanistan and Africa ends.
The end of a cycle?
Today there is no longer any major military operation carried out by the Allies, Europeans or Americans, with an executive mandate and the exercise of force (1). NATO's major land operation ended in Afghanistan in the summer of 2021 in a hurry. The French operation in Mali has just ended with the withdrawal of the last military base held, Gao (see box). On the European side, the two maritime operations EUNAVOFR Atalanta (Indian Ocean) and EUNAVFOR Med (Mediterranean) have lost a good part of their interest and are essentially reduced to making “circles in the water”. Even major UN operations are coming to an end. MONUSCO in the Democratic Republic of Congo begins its withdrawal. MINUSMA in Mali is faltering.
Towards operations of another nature
This is not the end of external interventions. But these return to a more classic situation: supply of weapons, advice, training and training; intelligence and special forces operations; aerial or underwater reconnaissance, targeted drone strikes if necessary. The idea of a strong presence of ground troops in operations and following the best practices, carried out nationally or multinationally (NATO), with the exercise of force, therefore seems to be turning. The war in Ukraine is an example of this new trend. In the end, we come back to a principle acquired during the Cold War. No Russian-Western (or Sino-Western) frontal conflict. But a war by proxy.
Very contrasting results
We cannot say that this frenetic external military interventionism has been successful or has not been a factor in stability and peace, even in the fight against terrorism. More than twenty years after the military intervention (US + NATO) in Afghanistan. (2001), the Taliban are back in Kabul. And the country is still in the doldrums. Nearly twenty years after the military intervention (US + Allies) in Iraq (2003), the country has still not recovered. Iranian influence is stronger than ever there, as in a large part of the Middle East (Yemen, Syria, Lebanon). Great result! More than ten years after the intervention (Franco-British + NATO) in Libya (2011), the country is in chaos, the door remains open to all types of trafficking. And Africa has lost one of its poles of attraction and ultimately of balance. The worst example of a poorly prepared, poorly judged intervention. Finally, almost ten years after the intervention at Mali (2013), power is in the hands of the military, close to Moscow. Russia has regained a foothold in a key country in the Sahel. And terrorists are still at work, not only in Mali but now throughout West Africa.
At least three reasons for failures
We will have to take a moment to look back and examine the reasons for these serial failures or semi-failures. We can of course condemn outright any external military intervention. Easiest solution. The point should be qualified: examine where the flaws in this operating mode were. Briefly, we can give three avenues for reflection. First, the vagueness of the objectives. Certain operations were sometimes designed quickly, sometimes for very personal reasons (see Sarkozy in Libya). They then often deviated from their initial objective (2). Second, the strategy of chaos or stagnation. Some operations were interrupted once the power in place was destroyed (Iraq, Libya), leaving a certain chaos in place. Other operations (Afghanistan, Barkhane) were long-term without knowing what the final objective was, other than staying put. Third, most of these operations were designed without any real control or public feedback. The role of parliament in France has been reduced to a chamber for recording presidential decisions. Ditto for NATO operations in Afghanistan or Libya, authorized by a complacent United Nations security council.
The semi-failure of Barkhane
The French operation in Mali is a typical example. Designed as a rapid intervention to confront a terrorist advance towards the capital, Bamako, Operation Serval launched in early 2013 was a success. Its transformation into a regional operation, called Barkhane, with anti-terrorist aims, was less glorious. The objective was more vague and multiple, between the reconstruction of the Malian armies and the Malian State, military cooperation, the eradication of terrorist groups, the stabilization of the State, preventing any foreign interference, we only had spoiled for choice. It was poorly understood by local populations and even armies. And the weakness of its results remains patent. Even on a military level, the results are not miraculous. Certainly several thousand “terrorists” have been neutralized. Certainly the prospect of an Islamic caliphate in Mali has been remote. Certainly the risk of an attack in France did not materialize (3). But there are still so many members of terrorist groups there. These have now spread like wildfire, clearly threatening several countries in the region, starting with Burkina Faso and Niger, and even Benin and Togo. And the reconstruction of the Malian state has not happened... Finally, the departure of the French military is neither voluntary nor planned. It results from a choice by the Malian government which decided to change the stabilizing force, preferring the Russians to the French. A real geopolitical defeat in a French-speaking territory coupled with a semi-military failure.
(Nicolas Gros-Verheyde)
The closure of the Gao base on August 15 The last logistics convoy left the PFOD (desert operational platform) in Gao (Mali) on Saturday (August 13) joining the base in Niamey, from Saturday to Sunday (August 14), “ safely “according to the staff of the French armies (EMA). A group of about 150 soldiers who guarded the camp, remained until the end, left on the night of August 14 to 15. The Gao camp was handed over " under conditions previously planned during coordination meetings with the Malian armed forces “says the EMA spokesperson. " What could be won was taken away ” assures our interlocutor during the dozens of logistics convoys by road (several per week) or by air (400 A400M rotations). From " material was however left on the spot with the Minusma or the partners on the spot “: computer equipment in particular. As for the infrastructure of the camp which " is operational ", she has " made available to the FAMA », the Malian armed forces.
- I make an exception for the two operations on European territory, in the Balkans, launched in the 1990s: EUFOR Althea Bosnia-Herzegovina and KFOR in Kosovo, which responded to other imperatives.
- Operations centered on an objective and completed on time with a certain success can be counted on the fingers of one hand: EUFOR Tchad and EUFOR RCA in particular.
- A contested and questionable hypothesis, to the point that it is no longer included in official discourse today.
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