Discourse and Strategic Use of the Military in France and Europe in the COVID‐19 Crisis

In March 2020, the French President called to war against the COVID‐19 which was followed by the launch of a military operation called Operation Resilience. This use of martial rhetoric initiated an effective mobilisation consisting in logistical assistance to the health sector. While armies are increasingly used to deal with environmental disasters, aside from their traditional role, this paper postulates that the geography of the French and international military engagement can be used to analyse both the institutional strategy of crisis management and the message governments send to their population. Military involvement differs in terms of missions given and of the amount of troops mobilised. It first questions the use of the military in the name of national resilience in the political discourse and the way it displays a symbolic message to the population, before analysing the role of armies in the crisis through the spatiality of their interventions. In March 2020, the French President called to war against COVID‐19 and mobilised the army for an operation called Operation Resilience. Recoursing to the military has been a common response to the pandemic for European countries. This article aims to question the function of this call to war through the analysis of the spatiality of military actions in France, compared to the military commitment in others European countries.