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The French army is one of the primary tools serving a policy that seeks to maintain the neocolonial order established in the 1960s. It ensures the defense and protection of countries and leaders subordinated to France and symmetrically represses movements or destabilizes regimes that oppose the interests of the former colonial power. These interests, a legacy of the colonial period, are mainly economic in nature, beginning with those that ensure France’s energy independence (uranium, petroleum, or natural gas obtained at low prices). It is also a question of maintaining a certain number of client-states within the French orbit, contributing to its status as a major power on the international stage, a legacy of the colonial era. The official objectives of the French military interventions in Africa often do not correspond to the true objectives pursued in the shadows. From the perspective of official military theory, two types of non-conventional actions can be carried out: special operations and clandestine actions. The first are acts of war performed by specialized and sometimes secret military units. The second are executed by secret services, which can resort to illegal means and are not officially recognized. In reality, the border between the two types of operations is fluid, and recourse to supervised mercenaries clouds the issue.