Chad

Through the ages

Rivals in history

The kingdoms, empires and states Chad fought or stood against, from the first to today.

1. Bulala1350 to 1510

   A people from around Lake Fitri, the Bulala fought the Sayfawa kings of Kanem in the fourteenth century and drove them west of Lake Chad, to Bornu. The Sayfawa won Kanem back from them in the early sixteenth century.

2. 🇸🇩 Sultanate of Darfur1700 to 1874

   Wadai and its eastern neighbour Darfur fought repeatedly in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries over the borderlands between them and over who would control the trade routes. The rivalry faded after Egypt's forces conquered Darfur in 1874.

3. Rabih az-Zubayr1879 to 1900

   A warlord from Sudan, Rabih led a slave raiding army west, ravaged Bagirmi and conquered Bornu in 1893. French columns killed him at Kousséri on 22 April 1900, opening the region to French rule.

4. 🇫🇷 French colonial empire1891 to 1920

   French columns conquered the region from 1891 against fierce resistance. They destroyed Rabih's army in 1900 and took Abéché, the Wadai capital, in 1909, but needed many more years to hold the northern deserts of Borkou, Ennedi and Tibesti.

5. 🇱🇾 Libya1973 to 1994

   Libya occupied the Aozou strip from 1973 and intervened in Chad's civil war. In the Toyota War of 1987 Chadian forces routed the Libyan army. The International Court of Justice gave the strip to Chad in 1994, and Libya withdrew.

6. 🇸🇩 Sudan2005 to 2010

   During the Darfur war each side accused the other of arming rebels. Chadian rebels based in Sudan attacked N'Djamena in 2006 and 2008, and Sudanese rebels linked to Chad struck Omdurman in 2008. A deal in 2010 ended the proxy war.

7. Boko HaramSince 2015Still open

   The jihadist group spread from Nigeria to the islands of Lake Chad. Suicide bombings hit N'Djamena in 2015, and attacks on army posts near the lake in March 2020 and October 2024 killed dozens of soldiers. Chad fights it alongside its neighbours.

Today

Chad now

Chad emerged from a collection of powerful states that controlled the Sahelian belt starting around the 9th century. These states focused on controlling trans-Saharan trade routes and profited mostly from the slave trade. The Kanem-Bornu Empire, centered around the Lake Chad Basin, existed between the 9th and 19th centuries, and at its peak, the empire controlled territory stretching from southern Chad to southern Libya and included portions of modern-day Algeria, Cameroon, Niger, Nigeria, and Sudan.

Capital

N'Djamena

Government

presidential republic

Head of government

Idriss Déby

Head of state

Mahamat Déby

Languages

Arabic, French

Area

1,284,000 km²

Through time

Then and now

• Population19.3 million2023 · 2.5 million in 1950
• Life expectancy55.1 years2023 · 35.2 years in 1950
• GDP per person$1,3932022 · $815 in 1950
• Living in cities28%2025 · 5% in 1950
• Literacy31%2019
• Political regimeElectoral autocracy2025 · Closed autocracy in 1950
• Military alliancesNone of these2024 · None of these in 1950
• Military spending3.2% of GDP2025
• War deaths0.7 per 100,0002025

Population: HYDE 3.3, Gapminder and UN WPP. GDP per capita: Maddison Project Database 2023. Urban share: UN WPP. Life expectancy: Riley, HMD, UN WPP. Literacy: OWID historical estimates, World Bank, UNESCO. Military spending: SIPRI. War deaths: UCDP. Political regime: V-Dem, Regimes of the World. All via Our World in Data (CC BY 4.0). Alliances and organization memberships: compiled by Atlas. Satellites in orbit: CelesTrak SATCAT. Modern borders, backcast.

Relations

Close partners and tensions

Summarised from World Bank and Wikipedia data, updated 24 October 2026.