The July 2023 overthrow of President Mohamed Bazoum in Niamey created an opening that external powers moved quickly to exploit. What began as a domestic rupture has become a regional pivot point. Within six months the junta in Niamey had signalled a clear intent to shift security partnerships away from long standing Western actors and toward Moscow, culminating in January 2024 with formal statements that Russia and Niger would deepen military cooperation.
The choreography of visits and bilateral meetings that preceded that announcement is revealing about intent and speed. Russian deputy defence officials travelled to Niamey in December 2023. In mid January 2024 Niger’s junta delegation, led by Prime Minister Ali Lamine Zeine and including the defence minister, visited Moscow where interlocutors from Russia’s defence and foreign ministries discussed steps to broaden defence, technical and economic ties. Those exchanges were publicly framed as efforts to stabilise the region and to expand training and military-technical cooperation.
This is not an isolated bilateral realignment. Mali and Burkina Faso have already pivoted toward Russia in recent years, and Moscow’s security footprint in the Sahel has been built through a mix of private military contractors, state-to-state military-technical ties, and visible diplomatic outreach. The pattern in Mali — where Russian private military actors became a prominent force on the ground as French forces withdrew — has provided a template and a political proof of concept for the Niger junta and for other regional actors seeking alternatives to Western partners.
At the same time, Moscow’s posture has been adapting. By the end of January 2024 reporting indicated that Russia was recruiting and reorganising forces under new structures intended to take on African deployments once associated with the Wagner network. Whether labelled as private contractors, “advisers,” or new state-controlled formations, the operational effect is the same: Russian-aligned personnel and materiel are being prepared to operate in theatre. Those developments matter because they convert political alignment into a tangible on-the-ground capacity.
Why Niger matters to this contest is straightforward. The country is strategically placed in the central Sahel, has long hosted external counterterrorism infrastructure, and sits atop significant mineral resources including uranium that draw international interest. The junta’s outreach to Moscow therefore carries both security and resource diplomacy dimensions. For Western capitals the loss of access to Nigerese basing, intelligence and overflight rights would be a practical setback for counterinsurgency campaigns across the region. For Niger the political calculus is also domestic. The junta seeks partners who will not condition support on an immediate return to the previous constitutional order.
The regional political picture compounds the strategic implications. By late January 2024 a set of Sahelian juntas were rhetorically distancing themselves from ECOWAS and Western security arrangements. That erosion of regional consensus reduces the diplomatic levers available to external actors and raises the bar for coordinated responses to illicit flows, crossborder insurgency and arms proliferation. Moscow’s moves exploit those fractures: where regional institutions weaken, bilateral security offers become more attractive to fragile regimes.
The practical consequences over the medium term depend on several variables. First is the depth of Moscow’s actual commitments: whether agreements translate into enduring basing rights, air-defence installations, training pipelines, or recurrent logistics. Second is the reaction of other external actors. The United States and European partners face choices between contesting influence through resumed engagement and assistance, or ceding operational access while seeking alternative hubs and partnerships. Third is the domestic stability of Niger and its neighbours; external military ties will do little to reverse the deeper drivers of insurgency without parallel improvements in governance and service delivery.
Policy responses should reflect that layered reality. Western actors must be pragmatic about preserving critical counterterrorism functions while avoiding a myopic focus on basing at any cost. That means accelerating diplomatic engagement that ties security assistance to verifiable steps on governance, and strengthening multilateral channels that can address crossborder threats without appearing as unilateral intrusion. At the same time the international community should invest in resilience measures that reduce the political attraction of transactional security guarantees, such as support for civil institutions, economic stabilization and regional information sharing.
The Niger case will be a test of whether military realignments in the Sahel become durable strategic shifts or episodic bargains driven by short term political expediency. If Moscow converts early goodwill into lasting presence, the Sahel’s security landscape will be reordered for years. If not, the moment may yet pass. Either outcome will reshape how Europe, the United States and regional actors think about deterrence, partnerships and the long term architecture for Sahel security.