French participation in a potential Syria strike would be the third time in recent years that Paris was the primary or sole U.S. ally in a military operation the Obama administration was wary of undertaking alone. France has effectively supplanted Britain as Washington’s main partner in limited military interventions around the world. It’s a far cry from 2003, when France’s vocal opposition to the coming Iraq War led angry Republicans to force the House cafeteria to start serving “freedom fries” and “freedom toast” to remove any reference to France from its menu.

France’s muscular new approach was first on display in Libya, when then-French President Nicolas Sarkozy led the push to establish a no-fly zone over Libya and later ordered French forces to fire the first shots of the military intervention there. The French air force, ultimately joined by Britain and the U.S., played a central role in destroying much of Libyan strongman Muammar al-Qaddafi’s military assets, leading to his ouster and death at the hands of rebel forces.

Mali was an even stronger example. An al Qaeda affiliate and a pair of Islamist allies took control of northern Mali in early 2012, imposing sharia law over cities like the ancient town of Timbuktu and turning the region into a training ground of sorts for militants from other neighboring countries. By the beginning of 2013, the Islamists had pushed so far south that some U.S. officials worried that they’d conquer the entire country. The Obama administration condemned the Islamist push but made clear it had no appetite for a military intervention to stop it.