The Toyota War is the name commonly given to the last phase of the Chadian-Libyan conflict, which took place in 1987 in Northern Chad and on the Libyan-Chadian border. It takes its name from the Toyota pickup trucks used as technicals to provide mobility for the Chadian troops as they fought against the Libyans. The 1987 war resulted in a heavy defeat for Libya, which, according to American sources, lost one tenth of its army, with 7,500 troops killed and 1.5 billion dollars worth of military equipment destroyed or captured. Chadian losses were 1,000 troops killed.
The war began with the Libyan occupation of northern Chad in 1983, when Libya's leader Muammar al-Gaddafi, refusing to recognize the legitimacy of the Chadian President Hissène Habré, militarily supported the attempt by the opposition Transitional Government of National Unity (GUNT) to overthrow Habré. The plan was foiled by the intervention of France that, first with Operation Manta and later with Operation Epervier, limited Libyan expansion to north of the 16th parallel, in the most desertic and sparsely inhabited part of Chad. (Read more...)