Medieval-style fortifications are back in the Sahel

For anyone with an interest this article is cut down and pared slice of a portion of the work of Dr. Olivier Walther and Dr. Steven Radil, geographers at the University of Florida.

A somewhat longer article of theirs is Why African Borderlands Keep Burning (April 15, 2026) - https://africanarguments.org/2026/04/why-african-borderlands...

and a recent paper Mapping the long-term trajectories of political violence in Africa (MARCH 2026) - https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.06502

I thought walled towns died not due to state authority becoming stronger, but because offensive weaponry simply became effective enough to overcome walls. Walls can protect you from men with swords, but not from heavy artillery or bombers. Today, wouldn't a fleet of cheap drones render a wall moot?

The UK built [1] castles in Afghanistan recently too.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hesco_bastion

For anyone with an interest this article is cut down and pared slice of a portion of the work of Dr. Olivier Walther and Dr. Steven Radil, geographers at the University of Florida.

A somewhat longer article of theirs is Why African Borderlands Keep Burning (April 15, 2026) - https://africanarguments.org/2026/04/why-african-borderlands...

and a recent paper Mapping the long-term trajectories of political violence in Africa (MARCH 2026) - https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.06502

Fortifications never went anywhere.

Just in this century, the US used fortified camps in Iraq and Afghanistan, and so did the French in Sahel. And the Ukrainians fortified Dombas and effectively prevented the Russians to take it quickly. Then the Russians fortified the Zaporizhzhia frontline (the Surovikin line) which stopped the Ukrainian counter offensive in 2023.

And talking about Africa in particular, the border between Morocco and Algeria, and also Western Sahara, has been a fortified wall for the past 40 years now.

Coincidentally, this morning I happened to be in a hotel room where there was a TV-set showing some random TV channel, and there was a documentary showing that medieval-style fortifications have come back in the form of the new building of the US embassy in London, which is surrounded by a moat, presumably for fear of terrorists.

The UK built [1] castles in Afghanistan recently too.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hesco_bastion

In many of Latin America big towns and most of border towns, most middle-class houses are tiny versions of fortresses.

It is a sign of police incompetence, government collapse and the fact that those places are ruled by gangsters.

"Newly walled towns are a sign of shrivelling state authority" was my thought when I saw the walled off Capitol.

It is sad when the government needs walls to protect itself from its own people, a sign of weakness. To add to the irony the Capitol used to be, quite literally, the "people's house."

"Newly walled towns are a sign of shrivelling state authority" was my thought when I saw the walled off Capitol.

It is sad when the government needs walls to protect itself from its own people, a sign of weakness. To add to the irony the Capitol used to be, quite literally, the "people's house."

Thank you for the extra links i was think this article seemed to be missing context or a conclusion

Thank you very much.

Thank's it adds a lot to explain why something like this pops up in the Economist of all places

> The United States and its allies should align its efforts accordingly. That means accepting longer time horizons, investing in less visible cross-border mechanisms over high-profile bilateral wins, and recognising that the periphery is now the centre.

oh boy

> African governments understand this dynamic, which is why regional organisations like the African Union, the Economic Community of West African States, and even the juntas of the Alliance of Sahel States increasingly emphasise multinational responses.

Not to be too much of a panafrican commie here, but AES left the Ecowas months ago I hope(?) the authors were aware of this? Seems like worth mentioning, perhaps it means something who knows. I guess we learn more about what to think about the Shael states when the US or France invades them again in a few months from now.

But they also protect you from more low level lawlessness and if the law situation inside and outside the wall are the same (because of stronger states) they stop being worth maintaining.

Think in the US, the cops wouldn’t survive against a couple of machine guns and a drone strike, but they are still useful for security purposes.

The article is more talking about landscape fortifications like trenches, ramparts, moats, and berms that slow down trucks.

I suspect people are motivated by the desire not not catch stray bullets more than dissuade a concerted attack.

Depends on who you want to protect against.

For example if you want to protect against hordes of teenagers stealing everything from an Apple store, you just need a button to deploy barbed wire at all entrances and exits, and then a few guards with rubber bastons beat the shit out of everyone of them.

Walls can not protect you from dhijadists either, the mortars take out the city- and besieging starves it out. In sudan- a "walled and ditched" city recently fell to the djandjhawid.. https://www.iss.europa.eu/publications/commentary/fall-el-fa...

Iran changed the game with their missile and drone defense ability forever I think. Obliterating US bases in the region, and used precise targeting (for example, hit actual correct hotel floor number hundreds of miles away where commanders where stationed with cheap drones ~$30k). So the only real protection now seems to be distance, and not being a target worth the missile. Individual motorbikes in Ukraine conflict, vs any sort of troop concentration or high value vehicles like tanks, worth targeting how things are evolving

> I thought walled towns died not due to state authority becoming stronger, but because offensive weaponry simply became effective enough to overcome walls.

Yes, but people will also say that "Security through obscurity is not security" and then in the same breath sneer derisively at how leaving ssh on port 22 is just amateur hour stuff.

More of a Roman fort I'd say.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for the extra links i was think this article seemed to be missing context or a conclusion

Thank's it adds a lot to explain why something like this pops up in the Economist of all places

oh boy

But they also protect you from more low level lawlessness and if the law situation inside and outside the wall are the same (because of stronger states) they stop being worth maintaining.

Think in the US, the cops wouldn’t survive against a couple of machine guns and a drone strike, but they are still useful for security purposes.

The article is more talking about landscape fortifications like trenches, ramparts, moats, and berms that slow down trucks.

I suspect people are motivated by the desire not not catch stray bullets more than dissuade a concerted attack.

> I thought walled towns died not due to state authority becoming stronger, but because offensive weaponry simply became effective enough to overcome walls.

Yes, but people will also say that "Security through obscurity is not security" and then in the same breath sneer derisively at how leaving ssh on port 22 is just amateur hour stuff.

Depends on who you want to protect against.

Of course no fortification can withstand overwhelming force indefinitely, but el-Fasher held out 1.5 years while completely surrounded, which isn't too shabby. (Here's a map from a year prior: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/archive/5/52/... It's the small pink blob of army-controlled territory labeled "Al-Fashir" within the gray mass of the RSF.) And the RSF are a formerly government-affiliated civil war faction with a lot more firepower than jihadist militias like JNIM or ISSP.

If some trenches and an earth wall turn a short raid into a long siege, that at least gives the army some time to send reinforcements and attack the besiegers.

They give you time though. It's certainly not perfect, but no wall ever was. You could scale the old wall with a ladder if you wanted to, but it slowed you down and that gave the defenders time to do something about that.

Alone, no. But the fact that modern militaries still build them around bases in insecure areas should give you a moment's pause before dismissing them entirely.

More of a Roman fort I'd say.

Or an early Norman one, for the same reasons. The people in the fort were different to those outside, city walls were built later in the medieval period once those differences had reduced.

Fortifications never went anywhere.

And talking about Africa in particular, the border between Morocco and Algeria, and also Western Sahara, has been a fortified wall for the past 40 years now.

In many of Latin America big towns and most of border towns, most middle-class houses are tiny versions of fortresses.

It is a sign of police incompetence, government collapse and the fact that those places are ruled by gangsters.

If some trenches and an earth wall turn a short raid into a long siege, that at least gives the army some time to send reinforcements and attack the besiegers.

Alone, no. But the fact that modern militaries still build them around bases in insecure areas should give you a moment's pause before dismissing them entirely.

Or an early Norman one, for the same reasons. The people in the fort were different to those outside, city walls were built later in the medieval period once those differences had reduced.

The seat of the German parliament will be secured by a trench too (view the article for an image)

https://www.morgenpost.de/bezirke/mitte/article228419835/Sch...

A government fortification protects against military attack.

A city fortification protects against basic lawlessness in the absence of a government protective order. It’s a sign of personal level violence

The great revelation of Google Street View for me has been that such is more or less the world norm. Neighborhoods of entirely unbarred windows and unfenced lots are scarce on any continent.

The tragedy is that so few, at least here in the US, see the liberating value in them.

The seat of the German parliament will be secured by a trench too (view the article for an image)

https://www.morgenpost.de/bezirke/mitte/article228419835/Sch...

A government fortification protects against military attack.

A city fortification protects against basic lawlessness in the absence of a government protective order. It’s a sign of personal level violence

The great revelation of Google Street View for me has been that such is more or less the world norm. Neighborhoods of entirely unbarred windows and unfenced lots are scarce on any continent.

The tragedy is that so few, at least here in the US, see the liberating value in them.

Double berm or raised fortification, Kauwa, NigeriaPhotograph: Google Earth/Google Maps/Courtesy Olivier Walther and Steven M Radil

Jun 25th 2026|2 min read

Not much remains today of the walls, ramparts and moats that once surrounded Benin City in southern Nigeria. Yet for centuries these giant earthworks—second in length only to China’s Great Wall among man-made structures—bespoke a mighty civilisation whose authority extended across much of west Africa. By the standards of pre-colonial Africa, the Benin state was exceptionally strong: erecting the wall in a single dry season might have required mobilising as many as 5,000 men, each working ten hours a day. But as the empire withered and eventually succumbed to British invaders in the late 19th century, most of the earthworks vanished. So did those of many other fortified towns across west Africa.

This article appeared in the Middle East & Africa section of the print edition under the headline “The return of the rampart”

From the June 27th 2026 edition

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Medieval-style fortifications are back in the Sahel

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From the June 27th 2026 edition