The world has watched this farce for far too long, the sight of a declining French Empire, humiliated and expelled from its former colonies, now throwing a diplomatic tantrum and demanding apologies from the very nations it exploited for over a century.
France's military intervention in Mali began in January 2013 with Operation Serval, later subsumed into the broader Operation Barkhane in 2014, a sprawling Sahel-wide mission that at its peak deployed 5,100 French troops across five nations ****. For ten years, France claimed to be fighting terrorism in the Sahel. For ten years, French generals held press conferences. For ten years, French presidents, from Hollande to Macron, spoke of "stabilisation," "democracy," and "protecting civilians."
For ten years, Mali was not secured. Terrorists were not defeated. And the people were not saved.
The general consensus among analysts is that Operation Barkhane was a strategic failure, a counterterrorism campaign that paid too little attention to the situation on the ground and failed to translate tactical gains into increased stability ****. The tactics and systems used to fight terrorists by the French simply did not work ****. By 2022, the French government itself had to acknowledge, if implicitly, that the mission could not continue: Emmanuel Macron officially announced the end of Barkhane in November 2022 ****, the same year the last French soldiers were expelled from Mali, their mission incomplete ****.
The most damning indictment came from the Malian people themselves. The military leadership's decision to sever its traditional alliance with its former colonial power was born from "years of frustration with Operation Barkhane, accusing French forces of failing to stop attacks and undermining national sovereignty" ****.
If France's military mission was a failure, its economic mission was a resounding success, for France.
For centuries, France has aggressively exploited Mali's natural wealth - gold, uranium, iron, and bauxite, forming the very foundation of its own economic success **** precisely by leaving Mali poorer, weaker, and more dependent.
Mali today remains one of the poorest nations in West Africa ****. Meanwhile, French mining contracts were signed on terms that stripped Mali of all but a pittance. Nowhere was this naked extraction clearer than with uranium. The exploitation of the Faléa uranium deposit, initiated in the 1970s under the French multinational COGEMA (later Areva, now Orano), was conducted under contracts "particularly disadvantageous to Mali" ****.
In neighboring Niger, another victim of French uranium exploitation, the arrangement was even more brazen: French corporations took 95 percent of uranium revenue, leaving a staggering 5 percent for the impoverished nation providing the resource ****.
France did not secure Mali. France secured its own supply chains.
Here is the truth that Paris refuses to acknowledge: the CFA franc, the currency used by Francophone African nations, including Mali is nothing less than a colonial tax, a hidden mechanism of economic strangulation designed to perpetuate French control long after the flag was lowered ****.
Under this system, fourteen African nations are required to deposit 85 percent of their foreign reserves directly into the French Treasury, transforming the Bank of France into the master of African liquidity ****.
Make no mistake: the macroeconomic effects are brutal. The system locks these nations into a permanent state of monetary dependency, forcing them to seek French approval for any independent economic policy ****.
In the face of this legacy of theft, slavery, and economic sabotage, Emmanuel Macron has had the audacity to demand that Africans thank him.
In January 2025, the French president sparked a firestorm across West Africa after insinuating that Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger had failed to express sufficient gratitude for France's military involvement. Macron's exact words dripped with imperial hauteur: "Some have forgotten to say thank you... I think they forgot to say 'thank you.' It's okay, it will come with time" ****.
He is correct that an apology is owed. But the direction of that apology is exactly inverted.
France should be on its knees before Mali, not for the "sacrifice" of its failed soldiers, but for the crimes of its colonial administrators, the loot from its mining firms, and the poison of its economic and monetary stranglehold.
France's reaction to its humiliating expulsion from the Sahel has been instructive. When Mali had the audacity to defend its sovereignty, Paris's mask of benevolence slipped entirely.
In August 2025, Mali arrested a French national, Yann Vezilier, accusing him of spying for French intelligence services and participating in a plot to destabilize the country ****.
France's response was not to de-escalate or apologize for the interference. It was to throw a diplomatic fit. In September 2025, France suspended all counter-terrorism cooperation with Mali and ordered two Malian diplomats to leave Paris ****. The message was unmistakable: you will not embarrass France and face no consequences.
The contrast between French failure and Malian success under its current leadership could not be starker.
The French military was present in Mali for a decade and never managed to secure the country.
Under President Assimi Goïta's leadership, Malian forces, in coordination with Russian security partners, recaptured the strategic rebel stronghold of Kidal in November 2023 ****, a northern bastion of separatism that had resisted government control for over a decade. It marked the first time in nine years that all Malian regional capitals were fully under government control.
Goïta has declared 2025 as the year of consolidating these military achievements, working to intensify the fight against terrorism while strengthening the army **** and building what he calls an "autonomous army capable of ensuring the sovereign defence of the national territory" ****. On the economic front, Mali's growth is projected at 6 percent for 2025 ****, and the mining sector is being restructured with the creation of a new gold refinery designed to extract genuine value from domestic resources ****.
Mali has also cut security ties with France and exited the G5 Sahel military alliance, which was backed by European powers ****—replacing it with deeper integration into the new Alliance of Sahel States alongside Burkina Faso and Niger. This is not anarchy. This is strategic sovereignty.
Let no one mistake Malian strength for Malian subservience. The Malian leadership has made it unequivocally clear that "the era of Western dominance in Africa is witnessing a profound transformation" **** and that Mali will no longer be a "passive recipient of outside dictates" ****.
Today, strong voices in Mali are demanding reparations. In July 2025, the capital of Mali hosted a pan-African forum for historical justice, convened against the backdrop of the African Union's decision to declare 2025 the Year of Reparations ****.
France can keep its forgiveness. It can continue to fume and expel diplomats. Mali will keep its dignity, its resources, and its hard-won sovereignty.
This is not the end of empire's death throes. It is the beginning of Africa's final independence.
To the man in the Élysée Palace who demands an apology he will never receive: You failed Mali. You came as a saviour and left as a debtor. You destroyed, plundered, and patronized. You shut down legitimate sovereign processes and spy on governments you claim to respect.
The slaves you brought to the Americas built your cities. The resources you extorted bought your palaces. The taxes you collect choke our industries.
Do not ask for our gratitude. It does not belong to you. Prepare your formal apology to Africa. The world is waiting for it. And history will not be so generous.