French Foreign Legion

by Douglas Porch

  Although the old guard loyal to Vichy appeared to have a firm grip on the situation, clearly those legionnaires who came into the Legion to fight Hitler in 1940 were not content to be used, in the opinion of English legionnaire Anthony Delmayne,

  to fight undernourished natives unable to pay their taxes . . . when there were so many Nazis to be killed. Many of us had a considerable stake in the war. . . . Rumors that Vichy was going to sell us down the river filled these men with dread, and there were riots, mutinies, fights and suicides in the fort.25

  One such man with a stake in the war was Philip Rosenthal, future secretary of state for the Ministry of Economy and Finance of the German Federal Republic, who was taunted by his adjudant-chef “Ah, Monsieur has not left for England!” When his attempted desertion to the Spanish zone in Morocco failed, he found that his lieutenant could not comprehend any more than the adjudant-chef that he was not content any longer to give “good and loyal service to Hitler” by staying out of the war.

  He attributed [my desertion attempt] simply to what one called a “coup de tête.” Like many French officers he did not indulge in politics. He was content to obey his superior. France had ceased fighting, therefore he ceased fighting. This narrow minded loyalty explains why, in the beginning, only a relatively small number of officers rallied to de Gaulle: Not because they lacked a sense of honor, but through lack of lucidity. I tried to explain my reasons, but he interrupted me immediately: “Don't say anything that could hurt your case. I want to punish you only for illegal absence.”26

  Apparently neither man harbored any hard feelings, however, for in 1950 the lieutenant invited Rosenthal, who later successfully deserted and finished the war a major in the British army, for a drink in the officers mess at Meknès.27

  The loss of Syria in 1941 produced much the same effect upon many army officers in North Africa as Mers el Kébir had done in the French navy. Furthermore, many of the fifteen thousand soldiers of the Syrian garrison, cleverly allowed by the Germans to return to North Africa, preached a gospel of hatred and hostility to the British and Gaullists with the fervor of men who had been martyred for the faith. The French high command became more firmly convinced than ever that France could survive only by defending her neutrality and staying out of the war.28 But the situation was not completely under control, despite the firm grip maintained upon Sidi-bel-Abbès by the veterans of the 6e étranger. In part, this was a product of a desire to fight among professional soldiers, so much so that Colonel Barre was forced to intervene to squelch talk among some of the cadres of volunteering for the légion des volontaires français contre le bolchevisme recruited to fight in the German ranks on the eastern front.

  It was only too evident that many legionnaires and some young officers were growing increasingly impatient with Vichy neutrality.29 Those who cared to think about the fact that Vichy's position required them to point their guns in the same direction as those of the Germans were increasingly discontented, especially as German demands upon the French economy grew, Vichy collaboration in supporting Rommel's campaign in the Western Desert was more obvious, the United States entered the war, and the tenacious defense of the Soviet Union increasingly gave the lie to pessimistic predictions of Moscow's imminent collapse. More, the unmistakable air of obsolescence hung heavily over a force that tinkered with its mules and continued to build roads with traditional pick-and-shovel methods while a modern, technological war swirled around it. Rosenthal recorded that there was an agitated atmosphere in his unit caused in part by the fact that no one had any reason to be loyal to Vichy—the political refugees loathed the regime, while the Germans found it insulting to serve in a defeated army. Traditional Legion methods of controlling this sort of cafard by keeping the men busy on road mending simply served to make the situation worse.30 When Perrot-White was assigned to a Legion artillery battery at Port-Lyautey (Kenitra) in Morocco in August 1942, he discovered it crammed with convinced Gaullists from the commander down.31

  When the Allied invasion began on November 8, 1942, these divisions and doubts appear to have made some difference. Perrot-White claimed that he and his “Gaullist” battery adopted a passive attitude of not firing at the American troops, or firing wide, which failed to save them from destruction by the American planes, a fate also suffered by a convoy of Legion reinforcements sent from Fez. He only agreed to drive a truck in the evacuation after he persuaded himself that it did not constitute a “combatant act.” However, even he was disgusted when a group of Spaniards whom he believed to be part of the REC surrendered to the Americans without firing a shot: “This act I considered a blot upon the honour of the Legion,” he wrote. “Even if they did not want to fight against the Allies, they could have done the same as we had,-adopted a passive attitude and stayed where they were. Deliberately turning themselves over as prisoners was an unforgivable military crime.”32

  Not surprisingly, perhaps, given the high percentage of veterans of the 6e étranger in residence, the attitude of the soldiers at Sidi-bel-Abbès to the news of the invasion was more decisive. Major Rouger reported that his men “left Bel-Abbès with the conviction that they were going to do some ‘good work’ and that the enemy would have to deal with them despite their lack of armament.” However, Rouger was destined to be doubly disappointed. First, because dug in on the road between Sidi-bel-Abbès and Oran, hostilities were suspended before the fighting reached them. His only contribution to the combat that raged around Oran was to refuse to allow a convoy through whose commander, he believed, intended to defect to the Americans. News of the end to the fighting caused “consternation” and left his men crying with frustrated rage over the unavenged deaths of comrades in other regiments. His second disappointment occurred when his Legion convoy returned to Sidi-bel-Abbès to be greeted with wild enthusiasm by “a large portion of the population, especially the Jews,” under the mistaken impression that they were being liberated by the Americans.33

  The End of “Neutrality”

  The successful Allied invasion did not immediately restore the Legion to its predebacle brilliance—quite the contrary. Until the end of the war, the Legion continued to be plagued by three problems: continued division between Gaullists and those who had remained loyal to Vichy, a shortfall of recruits and, finally, the problems of restoring combat efficiency. Given the bitter experience of Syria, the return of the prodigal sons of the 13e DBLE to Sidi-bel-Abbès in 1943 was hardly regarded by the “maison-mère” as an occasion for corporate festivity. An honor guard sent by the 13th from Tunisia to Algiers for de Gaulle was escorted back to the frontier under armed guard. The old guard continued to salute the outsized portrait of Pétain displayed prominently in the barracks for weeks after the Allied invasion, and to protest furiously the desertions from the Legion to the 13th, due no doubt to the prestige of the Free French, but attributable also to the expectation of higher pay. Nor in every case were these “desertions” spontaneous—Gaullist officers organized a network to channel “deserters” from the 1er étranger to the 13th, an act of hostility that brought contingents from the two units to a menacing confrontation in the suburbs of Sidi-bel-Abbès during one such illicit transfer of recruits. For its part, the BSLE established a spy network in the 13th. Bad relations continued beyond the official abolition of the Free French forces on August 1, 1943, so that when the first replacements of 17 officers, 20 NCOs, and 180 legionnaires arrived at the 13th from Sidi-bel-Abbès they were coolly received. Some of the replacement officers, exasperated by the frequent accusations of being “eleventh hour-joiners” flung at them, eventually transferred out.

  While relations gradually improved between the 13th and Sidi-bel-Abbès, tensions between the Gaullists and the old Pétainists, many of whom switched their allegiance to de Gaulle's resistance rival General Henri Giraud after November 1942, surfaced periodically until the end of the war. The old 1er division française libre, of which the 13e DBLE was part, despite successive name changes in 1943 and 1944, retained the G
aullist Cross of Lorraine on its shoulder patch, in contrast with the rest of the Armée d'Afrique, which wore a Gallic cockerel silhouetted against a sunburst as its symbol. The separate symbols were abandoned only for “Operation Anvil,” the invasion of southern France in the summer of 1944. The 13th took its individualism even further, daring to distance itself from one of the most potent of Legion symbols—in Italy and later in France, the 13th continued to parade in its Narvik beret rather than the white kepi, which it finally consented to wear for the victory parade in 1945. The reequipping of the Free French troops on the American model after 1943 would also be a source of friction. While in the final campaign in the winter of 1944-45 officers of the 13th complained that they were starved of supplies and recruits to the benefit of other Legion units and were assigned the hardest fighting by ex-Vichy generals who deliberately sought their destruction, claims that appear unfounded.34

  Recruitment posed a second problem for the Legion, and offered a repeat in many respects of its World War I experience. The shortfall of enlistments during the dark years after 1940 and the pilfering by the Armistice Commission left the Legion seriously undermanned at the very moment when the opportunity to return to the war at last presented itself. By 1943, 14,342 men remained on the Legion rolls, a number reduced further by desertions and “illegal absences,” which increased in 1943 even in the 13th. This was caused in part by ten months of inactivity between the end of the North African fighting and the 13th's entry into Italy. But worse, other Allied armies where the pay and conditions of service, and less stringent discipline, not to mention the prestige, were generally higher than in the Legion exerted an often irresistible attraction—for instance, around sixty legionnaires classified as “bad elements” deserted the 13th in 1943 for the better life of the British army.35 A report of March 14, 1943, complained of a feeling that the Legion was dying because so many legionnaires were eager to get into their national armies. The spectacle of ex-legionnaires returning as officers of the U.S. Army, complete with inflated American pay, had also increased the feeling that legionnaires were missing out on their share of wartime prosperity and prestige.36 The Allies had picked up where the Germans left off, securing the release of Poles, Belgians, Dutch and Luxemburgers and even some Russians, which in 1945 caused Legion Lieutenant Colonel Gaultier to echo fears similar to those of Rollet in 1918 that “one risks arriving rapidly at the disappearance of the Foreign Legion.”37 The Dutch consul in Algiers was especially effective in securing the discharge of his nationals from the Legion.38 But not all losses were due to desertions and the Allied shakeout of their nationals. The Germans, too, could take some credit for causing the Legion some manpower problems in battle, from 1943.

  The problem was how to replace these departures, and here the Legion faced many obstacles, some of their own making. Few legionnaires whose enlistment contracts had terminated, especially the Spaniards, were storming the company offices to reenlist. A November 23, 1944, report from Lieutenant Colonel Tritschler of the régiment de marche de la légion étrangère (RMLE) complained that these men were given residence permits too easily and that they should be sent into concentration or work camps as a means of forcing them to remain, an indication that you could take the Legion out of Vichy, but it was infinitely more difficult to take Vichy out of the Legion.39 It also appears that the Legion sometimes simply kept men beyond their legal time of service. How widespread this practice was is not clear. However, the 3e étranger admitted in 1945 that “a notable quantity of desertions” could be attributed to the practice of keeping legionnaires beyond the expiration of their contracts.40

  Desperate for recruits, the Legion sought out other sources, which even included those volunteers of 1939–40 whom it had demobilized, scorned and abandoned in the camps of southern Algeria and Morocco. Even though Legion recruiting officers in the camps were accused by the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker organization active in the camps, of resorting to threats to denounce the internees to the Allies as fascists and even to imprisonment and torture, not surprisingly, few evinced any burning desire to renew their Legion experience. Some agreed to serve in the British Pioneer Corps. Most simply wanted to put as much distance between themselves, France and the Legion as possible.41

  Legion officers complained that the government was allowing foreigners to join regular French units and the Polish forces or remain in resistance units rather than requiring them to enlist in the Legion.42 So desperate was the Legion for soldiers that in August 1944 it even snapped up 650 Ukrainians complete with German uniforms and arms, whose defection from the 30th SS Division to the French resistance was organized by the American Office of Strategic Services. The Resistance handed them over to the Americans. Quick negotiations allowed them to be incorporated into the reinforcement-hungry 13e DBLE, where they operated with their own officers. This was a suspension of the Legion's normal practice of mixing nationalities and can only be explained by the desperate pressure of circumstances. A second Legion practice was also suspended in the case of these men when Soviet complaints forced the French to surrender them to the certain death of Communist justice, while the remainder were pursued by Stalin into Indochina after the war.43 Clearly, the world conflict was playing havoc with the Legion's laws of asylum.

  The world conflict would also play havoc with the Legion's attempt to recover its combat efficiency, a third major problem it faced. The Allied invasion of Morocco and Algeria had demonstrated in a few brief hours of fighting that the French armistice army was hopelessly outclassed technologically by its better-armed opponents. That lesson would be driven home forcefully in the opening weeks of 1943, when both the 1er and 3e étrangers contributed forces to drive the Germans out of Tunisia. Unfortunately for the Allies, Rommel insisted upon a delayed departure. Two German offensives launched in January and February 1943 to drive the Allies from the approaches to Tunis savaged the Legion, as they did the U.S. Army at Kasserine Pass. That spearheaded by the 10th Panzer Division on January 18 from Pont du Fahs southwest of Tunis quickly surrounded the second battalion of the 3e étranger and eventually overran the position, capturing two Legion battalion commanders. According to Legion records, the legionnaires earned compliments for their resistance from the German commander.

  On the 19th, the German attack pursued its relentless course to the southwest, with panzers driving along the main routes while German infantry closely supported by artillery infiltrated around French positions on the mountain paths. The French withdrew through the broken terrain, but the retreat was a costly one. Although the French claimed to have inflicted numerous casualties upon the Germans,44 a report of March 14, 1943, noted that the 3e étranger lost thirty-five officers and 1,600 legionnaires in January alone.45 What was more, the 3rd also forfeited its flag, the most decorated in the Legion, when its forward units were overrun on January 18–19. Happily for the Legion, Axis efficiency on the battlefield did not on this occasion extend to the après-bataille. After taking suitable pictures of Axis officers holding up their battle trophy, one of which was published in the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, the German command used the flag to decorate a meeting room in some buildings converted into a field hospital. Two French residents of Tunis discovered the flag in the back of a German ambulance during the Axis retreat in May, and gave it to General Giraud, who restored it to the Legion. Fortunately, no one seemed to notice during the Tunis victory parade of May 20, 1943, that the Legion's most celebrated flag had lost the streamers denoting its World War I decorations during its three months of captivity.46

  While Legion histories compliment the Legion on its heroic performance in the Tunisian campaign, it was apparent that heroism by itself was insufficient against an army as efficient as the Wehrmacht. In the main, French units had been assigned secondary tasks of holding flanking high ground in support of major thrusts by American and British troops, where they performed yeoman service. But the ability to hold ridge lines tenaciously in Tunisia could not overcom
e the poor impression made upon the British and Americans by the somewhat hoary exoticism of The Armée d'Afrique, which appeared to them to be a meeting between extras from a Hollywood film set and a convention of antique weapons collectors, backed by a supporting cast of mules. The rapid collapse of France in 1940; the two-year period of “neutrality” of the North African officer corps, which appeared inexplicable, if not inexcusable, in Allied eyes; the long period of bickering between the North African hierarchy and the Allied command after the November 1942 invasion, followed by the quarrels among the Gaullists and supporters of General Giraud, served to reinforce the low opinion in which the “Anglo-Saxons” held French capabilities.

  Despite these reservations, the Armée d'Afrique fell under the tutelage of the U.S. Army's French Army Instruction and Training Corps, which undertook to reequip the tatterdemalion regiments of North Africa with modern equipment and instruct them in its use. For the Legion, this meant learning how to become mechanized infantry able to operate in conjunction with tanks. Outdated French equipment gave way to jeeps, half-tracks and an array of weapons that left many veterans of “old” Legion, now told that they must “disguise themselves as Americans,” bug-eyed with astonishment. Even though impromptu songs that compared American helmets to soup bowls and insisted that their rifles had seen service in the Civil War—in fact, they were 1917-model Garand rifles—were soon topping the concert bill on mess nights, the avalanche of ironmongery was like food placed before a claque of starving children.47