The objective was to link all French possessions in Western Africa, and this was achieved on April 21, 1900, on the right bank of the Chari in what is now Chad opposite Kousséri, in what today is northern Cameroon.

Rabih gained three cannons from this victory (which the French later retook at Kousséri) and ordered his son Fadlallah, whom he had left in Dikoa, to hang Béhagle.

In response, a French column proceeding from Gabon and led by Émile Gentil, supported by the steamboat Leon Blot, confronted Rabih at Kouno at the end of the year.

This column was now commanded by Joalland-Meynier, after Voulet and Chanoine murdered the French officer sent to relieve them, when news reached the European press of the mission's brutality to local people.

The march of the infamous Voulet–Chanoine Mission through modern Burkina Faso and Niger brought nominal protectorate status to these areas, and forces from Algeria showed that a cross-saharan conquest and administration was possible.