Legion changing

Hi Nick,

I watched a couple of documentaries on the Foreign legion when I lived in the UK, and, like most people I guess, I thought f--k me what a hard bunch of b'stards etc. However, I recently watched a similar type of documentary in France (in French) all about the legion, and was surprised at some of the footage as it didn't portray them in quite the same light.

It showed a recruit on parade with a ringing mobile in his pocket? Twat!and, a recruit on a specialist divers course who couldn't even pass the very basic free dive test? Needless to say he was rejected. All in all they seemed more like the ramshackle bunch of knobs you get in the UK forces (I've been there).

Was it a more realistic portrayal of the Core, or do you think the standards have slowly declined since they have been forced to clean up their recruitment policy ie. no more - 'no questions asked'?

ps. did you find it easy to learn the lingo, or were you already proficient at french?

Like every military there are both ends of the spectrum. On one end you have some incredibly good Legion troops such as 2nd REP and CRAPS (pathfinder unit) and at the other you have the lazy bastids that are looking for a steady paycheck without working too hard.

Documentaries then can be set up in whatever way the director wants to make them. Edit out the hard core guys, stick in a few zobs and voila, instant "the - insert name of army here - is crap" documentary. Do the opposite and, presto instant "what a bunch of hard fookers the - insert name of unit here - are"

You are right about a slight slackening of the standards though. The left wing hates the Legion but can't do anything about getting rid of it. What they've done instead is pressured the powers that be to bring it more in line with the regular French army. (why you'd want to do that is beyond me) That means the old Legion way of brutal punishment has been filtered out and the buy the book politically correct way of administering discipline is being brought in its stead.

Nick