In Bamako, Tuesday, September 17 was to be marked by the opening of the trial of the purchase of the presidential plane, a symbol of the fight against corruption of the former regime, promised by the junta of Colonel Assimi Goïta. It ultimately turned out to be the day that will mark the most significant jihadist attack in the Malian capital since the military coup in 2020. The very image of humiliation: that of a fighter from the Support Group for Islam and Muslims (GSIM), on the tarmac of the airport, calmly setting fire to the reactor of said plane.
The attack began around 5:30 a.m., before the first rays of the sun had begun to dart the waters of the Niger River. Gunfire and detonations echoed around the gendarmerie school, in the Faladié district, and about ten kilometers further south, near Modibo-Keïta airport. Very quickly, the GSIM published a first press release, in which it claimed to have carried out a “specific operation” against the“military airport and a gendarmerie training base” which caused“enormous human and material losses”as well as the “destruction of several combat aircraft.”
In Faladié, the attack was quickly contained by the army. In a statement, the general staff declared that:“A group of terrorists tried to infiltrate the gendarmerie school”adding that sweeps are being carried out and that the situation is “under control”. In the middle of the morning, General Oumar Diarra, the chief of staff of the armed forces, went to the scene and confirmed that “the terrorists who had infiltrated [ont] been neutralized”. Alleged accomplices are arrested and exhibited on television.
“The terrorists’ real target: the airport”
Although the authorities have not provided any human toll, a Malian officer assures the World that the attack on the gendarmerie school had a “sixty dead.” She would have also caused many injuries. The establishment houses in particular the headquarters of the elite units of the gendarmerie, the rapid action group for surveillance and intervention and the intervention platoon of the national gendarmerie.
“This attack on the gendarmerie school was a decoy and a means of neutralizing these special units to prevent them from intervening on the terrorists’ real objective: the airport”explains a military Source. In fact, until late Tuesday afternoon, shots were still ringing out and thick black smoke was rising above the tarmac. The attackers targeted Air Base 101, which hosts planes and helicopters from the Malian Air Force, as well as a detachment of Russian mercenaries from the Wagner Group, who were long unable, like the military on site, to repel the attack.
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