The Backfire - Africa at War

07 NOVEMBER 2004, FRENCH RESIDENTIAL DISTRICT, ABIDJAN, IVORY COAST:

Elements of the French Foreign Legion were monitoring peacekeeping operations during the Ivorian Civil War in 2004. French troops were scattered around the country's critical junctions to form buffer zones between Loyalist troops of President Laurent Gbagbo including the FANCI Militia and different Rebel factions. In November Ivorian president Laurent Gbagbo had ordered airstrikes to be carried out on Ivorian rebels. On November 6, 2004, at least one Ivorian Sukhoi Su-25 bomber attacked a position of France's Unicorn peacekeeping force in the rebel stronghold of Bouaké at 1 pm local time, killing nine French soldiers and wounding another 31. The Ivorian government claimed the attack on the French was unintentional, but the French insisted that the attack had been deliberate.

Within hours; French President Jacques Chirac personally ordered the destruction of the small Ivorian air force and the seizure of Yamoussoukro airport. The French military performed an overland attack on the airport and destroyed the small Ivorian air force parking on the field.

The French attack on Yamoussoukro raised the tensions in the country. On 7 November, armed mobs of Ivorians loyal to the government took to the streets of Abidjan, the largest city located at the Atlantic Coast. Rioters attacked a French school and army base. Crowds of young Ivorians attacked a residential district made up of French citizens, who had to be evacuated by airlift as mobs burst into their apartment buildings. Unable to control the situation, troops from the Foreign Legion; the 2nd Recon Company and the 1st Para Company (2nd Para Regiment) deployed in the French District to counter the attacks and gain time for the evacuating civilians as armed mobs overwhelmed the streets.