The Wagner Group in Africa: Size and Control

How Large is the Wagner Group in Africa?

Providing a precise number is difficult due to the group's opaque and fluctuating nature, but estimates can be broken down by country and function. The total number of Wagner personnel across Africa is estimated to be in the low thousands, likely between 3,000 and 5,000 at any given time, though this has been affected by the war in Ukraine and the death of Yevgeny Prigozhin.

Country-Specific Estimates:

Central African Republic (CAR): The largest and most entrenched presence, with an estimated 1,500 - 2,000 personnel. This includes military trainers, frontline combatants guarding mines and strategic sites, and security details for the president.

Mali: An estimated 1,000 - 1,500 personnel. They are heavily involved in combat operations against jihadist groups alongside the Malian army, and they provide security for key government installations in Bamako.

Libya: Several hundred to 1,000 fighters, deployed to support Khalifa Haftar's Libyan National Army (LNA). Their presence is more focused on military influence in the civil war and securing strategic assets like oil fields.

Sudan: Before the 2023 civil war, Wagner had several hundred personnel linked to the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), primarily focused on securing gold mining concessions. Their current status is complex due to the ongoing conflict.

Composition: The forces are a mix of experienced Russian veterans (often ex-special forces), contractors recruited for specific missions, and local auxiliary forces they train and command.

Do They Control Territory?

The answer is nuanced. Wagner does not typically exercise formal, sovereign control over territory by declaring itself the governing authority. Instead, it exerts de facto military and economic control over strategic zones, effectively functioning as a shadow state within a state.

Their model of control is based on three pillars:

1. Military Outposts and Resource Sites: Wagner directly controls specific, high-value points. In the CAR and Mali, they garrison key mining sites (gold, diamonds), timber forests, and strategic bases. They control access, provide security, and effectively govern these zones. In Libya, they control key military bases like Al-Jufra and Brak al-Shati.

2. "Security Provision" to Host Governments: Wagner's power stems from contracts with ruling regimes. In exchange for protecting the government from rebels and jihadists, they are granted concessions to exploit natural resources. This gives them immense political influence and a free hand to operate, making them a dominant power behind the throne rather than a public-facing government.

3. Economic Stranglehold: True control comes from controlling the economy. By dominating key resource exports like gold, Wagner funds its own operations and generates revenue for the Russian state, while making the host government dependent on them for financial and military survival.

Conclusion

In summary, the Wagner Group maintains a significant but dispersed force of several thousand personnel across Africa, with its largest contingents in the Central African Republic and Mali. They do not control territory in a formal sense but rather establish zones of de facto control over critical economic and military assets. Their power is projected through a combination of direct force, political patronage, and economic extraction, creating a form of indirect, corporate-style colonization. Following the death of Prigozhin, this network is now being more directly absorbed and managed by the Russian state, but its operational model in Africa remains largely intact.