Jihadists advancing, Western militaries on their way out, and an entire country on the brink of chaos. This description should sound painfully familiar. However, the country in question is not Afghanistan in 2021, but Mali in 2022. The parallels don’t stop there the multi-ethnic Sahel nation is also suffering under dubious government leadership and is host to a substantial number of international military stabilisation forces struggling to contain a growing Islamist insurgency. The sense of déjà vu may grow stronger yet because the security situation in the West African nation is rapidly deteriorating. Accordingly, Europeans could be staring down the barrel of another Afghanistan-like fiasco – only this time largely of their own making.