Here is a recap of France's most significant military losses since then.

- Lebanon: 58 killed (1983) -

On October 23 there are near simultaneous suicide truck-bomb attacks on US and French military compounds in Beirut.

First the US compound is destroyed, killing 241 Americans. The French Drakkar base is blown up minutes later, killing 58 French paratroopers.

Shiite radicals claim responsibility.

- Djibouti: 19 killed (1986) -

On May 18, 19 soldiers are killed when a Breguet-Atlantic sea surveillance plane crashes into a mountain in northern Djibouti.

France has a major military base in the Red Sea country, a former French colony.

- Afghanistan: 10 killed (2008) -

Ten French soldiers with the NATO force in Afghanistan are killed and 21 wounded on August 18 in a Taliban ambush about 50 kilometres (30 miles) east of Kabul.

- Others -

- Nine French soldiers are killed in a landmine explosion in northeastern Chad in April 1984.

- Another nine die in March 1995 in a road accident south of Sarajevo in Bosnia. They are part of the UN peacekeeping force.

- In November 2004, nine French soldiers are killed and more than 30 are wounded in the Ivory Coast when pro-government forces bomb their encampment at the central city of Bouake.

The soldiers were deployed to patrol a buffer zone between the rebel north and government-held south.

- In January 2015, nine French and two Greek military personnel are killed when a fighter jet crashes into parked aircraft during elite NATO training exercises in Spain.

- In May 2007, eight French and a Canadian soldier die in Egypt as a light aircraft crashes in the Sinai region after suffering a technical failure.

They were part of the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO) peacekeeping mission.

- Eight French soldiers die in January 2009 when their helicopter crashes at sea off Gabon.