Troupes Marine video + questions on Commando du chasse units

[OldRecon]

Another great French video on the history of the Troupes Marine (http://www.troupesdemarine.org/outils/multimedia/video/tdm3.mpg)

Say what you want about "surrender monkeys" and "frogs", but when it comes to making good videos on military matters available for downloading on the net, the French in my opinion are unsurpassed :).
Troupesmarine.org being one good site and the "fan page" of Dassault aviation another.

Btw, are looking for good books or articles on the Commandos de Chasse in English (hard to find), though have found some French books on the subject (maybe use it as a motivator for a bit of self study on the language?)

Commando du chasse equal in status to les Paras and the Legion as elite troops during the Algerian war?
Did the legion employ Commando du chasse units?.
As for the French general reserve units during the Algerian war, how did the 11 motorised infantry div. fare compared to the para divisions?

[gilgoul]

Another great French video on the history of the Troupes Marine (http://www.troupesdemarine.org/outils/multimedia/video/tdm3.mpg)

Say what you want about "surrender monkeys" and "frogs", but when it comes to making good videos on military matters available for downloading on the net, the French in my opinion are unsurpassed :).
Troupesmarine.org being one good site and the "fan page" of Dassault aviation another.

Btw, are looking for good books or articles on the Commandos de Chasse in English (hard to find), though have found some French books on the subject (maybe use it as a motivator for a bit of self study on the language?)

as far as I know, there was no clear structure for the "comando de chasse".
The technique seems to have been first used by the Legion and the other troops in great Kabylie, and then adapted and used everywhre else.
My Dad was soldier in a "meshta", small unit of "europeans" working with local militias and supletive forces (the Harkis}, something like 8 french soliders and 40 harkis.
From what I understood (he doesn`t talk too much about this time), they would periodically join search parties because they knew the area very well, and were more reliable than the supletive (He served in the 22eme BCA, Chasseurs alpins). Set ambushes and heving a "proactive" behaviour, rather than the rather static, "hearts and minds" job they where doing with the villagers around (area of Palestro/ Ras bouira)

Commando du chasse equal in status to les Paras and the Legion as elite troops during the Algerian war?
Did the legion employ Commando du chasse units?.
As for the French general reserve units during the Algerian war, how did the 11 motorised infantry div. fare compared to the para divisions?

[OldRecon]

as far as I know, there was no clear structure for the "comando de chasse".
The technique seems to have been first used by the Legion and the other troops in great Kabylie, and then adapted and used everywhre else.
My Dad was soldier in a "meshta", small unit of "europeans" working with local militias and supletive forces (the Harkis}, something like 8 french soliders and 40 harkis.
From what I understood (he doesn`t talk too much about this time), they would periodically join search parties because they knew the area very well, and were more reliable than the supletive (He served in the 22eme BCA, Chasseurs alpins). Set ambushes and heving a "proactive" behaviour, rather than the rather static, "hearts and minds" job they where doing with the villagers around (area of Palestro/ Ras bouira)

Which means your dad either was a "commando du chasse" or SAS (Section administrative specialice)?
Having read your answer on the Legion and Commando du chasse units.
I searched around a bit more and found pic of a Legion Commando du chasse unit badge (belonging to 2eme REI I think).
Nice twist with the Legion being the inventor for others rather than the other way around :).
As for other Commando du chasse units many seems to have been mixed units of "Europeans" and Harkis?
Harkis loosely translated to English = "War bands" (in plural form?)?
Understand it so that there were several cases of both individuals in a harka and whole harkis going over to the ALN (think Simon Murray in his autobiography "Legionnaire" mention one such occasion).
Yet on the other hand there appear to have been many ex harkis that had served France loyaly during the war who got to pay for it from their ALN opponents once Algeria gained independence in 1962?
Harkis employed as scouts/trackers/probing force both as pure Harkis units and as members of the C de chasse units?
As for my own experience with the SLA in Lebanon I've been tempted more than once at comparing them with the Algerian harkis, both in terms of tactical employment and ultimate fate. But that analogy maybe far fetched?

[gilgoul]

as far as I know, there was no clear structure for the "comando de chasse".
The technique seems to have been first used by the Legion and the other troops in great Kabylie, and then adapted and used everywhre else.
My Dad was soldier in a "meshta", small unit of "europeans" working with local militias and supletive forces (the Harkis}, something like 8 french soliders and 40 harkis.
From what I understood (he doesn`t talk too much about this time), they would periodically join search parties because they knew the area very well, and were more reliable than the supletive (He served in the 22eme BCA, Chasseurs alpins). Set ambushes and heving a "proactive" behaviour, rather than the rather static, "hearts and minds" job they where doing with the villagers around (area of Palestro/ Ras bouira)

Which means your dad either was a "commando du chasse" or SAS (Section administrative specialice)?
Having read your answer on the Legion and Commando du chasse units.
I searched around a bit more and found pic of a Legion Commando du chasse unit badge (belonging to 2eme REI I think).
Nice twist with the Legion being the inventor for others rather than the other way around :).
As for other Commando du chasse units many seems to have been mixed units of "Europeans" and Harkis?
Harkis loosely translated to English = "War bands" (in plural form?)?
Understand it so that there were several cases of both individuals in a harka and whole harkis going over to the ALN (think Simon Murray in his autobiography "Legionnaire" mention one such occasion).
Yet on the other hand there appear to have been many ex harkis that had served France loyaly during the war who got to pay for it from their ALN opponents once Algeria gained independence in 1962?
Harkis employed as scouts/trackers/probing force both as pure Harkis units and as members of the C de chasse units?
As for my own experience with the SLA in Lebanon I've been tempted more than once at comparing them with the Algerian harkis, both in terms of tactical employment and ultimate fate. But that analogy maybe far fetched?

I think the analogy is unfortunately accurate, Israel really dishounoured itslef by not treating the Tsadal beter than the french did with the Harkis.
As for what my dad exaclty did down there, i`d ask him, i`ll might call tomorrow.
All I know is that he got injured three times during ambushes, and that his last injury got him a tcket out of "combat" duty, he finished his tour (the last month and half as a "bar tender" at the HQ of the alpinist .
From what I got, there were a lot of inter unit ops, especially in his area (grande kabylie), where the legion mainly was present and active.
I saw a pic of him before going on ambush in the night of christmas 59, the guys next to him where legionnaires, but I couldn`t tell which regiment.
BTW, did you know that the "unoficial" weapon used during a lot of ambush where the STG44 (captured on fln)and 12 gauge hunting rifle, really nasty effects on short range.

[OldRecon]

I guess the Stg 44's were of Yougoslavian post WW-2 make?
As for 12 gauge shootguns, they were incidentaly reckoned by the British as the most efficient weapons available, with regards to achieving kills during the Malayan emergency.
Simon Murray also mention a memorable occasion in his book of a very lucky caporal chef surviving an encounter with a shootgun armed rebel through malfunctioning ammunition (double barrel shootgun - both rounds failing to go off :roll: ).
Hope the wounds your father incurred in Algeria wasn't of a too permanent character. Working in a point unit has its disadvantages.

As for your previous comment under another thread on the reason for the **** being a French national symbol vs. the MP-3's one can download from Troupesmarine.org, I guess there are few armed forces in the world that can sing as well "while walking in the ****" :) as the French.
Some of those recordings are real beatiful stuff woot.

Some pics of ALN fighters (guess they were taken before the Morice line was in place):

http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/aln/photo_23.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/aln/photo_17.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/aln/photo_05.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/aln/djounoud.jpg


A somewhat graphic pic of an ALN MG-34 crew (http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/aln/djounouds_tues.jpg)

Some Commando du chasse pics:

http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_chasse_l124/debriefing_400x283.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_chasse_l124/patrouille_boire_400x349.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_chasse_l124/choufe_qui_fume.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_chasse_l124/base_arriere_codo_124.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_chasse/photo_16.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_chasse/kimono23_300x230.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_chasse/photo_19.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_chasse/photo_33.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_chasse/helico_cobra.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_chasse/commandos_attente.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_georges/photo_30.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_georges/photo_32.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_georges/photo_29.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_georges/photo_31.jpg


Bigeard inspecting Commando "Georges"
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/commando_georges/bigeard_commandos_georges.jpg


No! these are not ALN's! A commando from 8e RCP "gone native"
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/para/photo_10.jpg

http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/para/photo_26.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/para/tireur_fm_3rpc.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/images/codo_heliporte.jpg

Some Legion pics:

http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/legion/photo_21.jpg
http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/legion/legionnaire_combat.jpg
Hard to digest if this is a training pic or pic taken on operations. If last maybe somewhat graphic (http://www.fncv.com/biblio/conflits/algerie/legion/leigonnaire_blesse.jpg)

Pics found at http://www.fncv.com

[Galileo]

Strange that legionnaire didn't wear helmet during combat or exercice, the 'kepi blanc' is only wear for parade not in combat.

[gilgoul]

Strange that legionnaire didn't wear helmet during combat or exercice, the 'kepi blanc' is only wear for parade not in combat.
That is one of the change that brought the algeria war.
You could still frequently see legionaires wearing their kepi during the first stage of the war.

[OldRecon]

Strange that legionnaire didn't wear helmet during combat or exercice, the 'kepi blanc' is only wear for parade not in combat.

In a picture book on the Legion published by Arms & armour press during the 80's (by Yves Tchsezabo or something like that - he's at least one of the official historians of the Legion) there is a big pic of a legionnaire with white kepi on top being hit by a fellagha bullet during operations.

Also according to Martin Windrow, who's a leading English authority on the Legion and Legion uniforms, use of kepi during operations was quite common in Legion infantry formations up to at least 1957.
Don't think the use of green beret outside Legion para formations was sanctioned by authorities before 1958.
Legion formations also seems to have used the broad brimmed bush hat rather than the Bigeard cap (who incidentaly was based on the Japanese field cap encountered by Bigeard in Indochina, rather than the Afrika korps cap as told by Jean Larteguy in his novel "Les Centurions").

[gilgoul]

Let`s put iut this way, my dad`s physical wound are mostly healed, he has a limp of one and some digestive weackness from the other.
What he did and saw there, I have his account for some part, and one of his former buddy for the other.
All I know is that he got involved in some ****ty situations.
But thanks for the inquiry.
He told me on the phone of this 12 gauge roud they would fire with those juxtaposed barrels,modified, that would shoot the two ammo`s at once, the ammos being lead ball with a wire welded between them and mouth fed.
deplorable accuracy, but would cut someone in half at 30 meters, and very usefull for bush clearing.
I don`t know how it would work, but seems pretty nasty.
I know he loved the garans too, fr it`s good accuracy, and got to use the usm1.
For what i understood, the "official" operations, like jumelle, where a waste of time, and where costly because people wouldn`t be able to use their "own captured or favourite" gun, but the MAT49 or MAS, wich most of them hated.

[fantassin]

Quote:

Don't think the use of green beret outside Legion para formations was sanctioned by authorities before 1958.


The first unit to wear the gren beret was the 13thDBLE when it went to Norway with the Chasseurs Alpins in 1940. They wore it throughout the war and kept it when they went to Indochina.

During the war in Indochina, the green beret was used by the BEPs, as well as green and red garrisson caps when off the field.
It then spread to the rest of the legion in Algeria.

The bush hat was the most common form of headgear in the field in Indochina but in Algeria, the Képi was also often used, either with a tan or a white cover. The CSPLE (saharian companies) wore it most of the time.

The REPs never wore it in the field.

For the Commandos DE chasse (not du), any unit could put one together with the most motivated volunteer of each unit.

Some were better known than others (Georges, Cobra) but the aim was always the same: to fight the FLN using FLN tactics (except the blind bombing of course).

The CdC could also be used as the QRF of those units that were mostly involved in endless cordon and search Op in the Djebels. When they found some FLN Katibas, they would often be told to force it to fight until an heliborne "unité d'intervention" (para, legion, air force commando or navy commando) was heli inserted in to close in for the final kill.

The Gendarmerie even put CdC together, just like many regular army unit.

[OldRecon]

Quote:

Don't think the use of green beret outside Legion para formations was sanctioned by authorities before 1958.


The first unit to wear the gren beret was the 13thDBLE when it went to Norway with the Chasseurs Alpins in 1940. They wore it throughout the war and kept it when they went to Indochina...


Ah I forgot about 13th DBLE.
Oh dear how could I? :cantbeli: :cantbeli:
Particularly with regards to the fact that the unit got its baptism of fire during the battle for Narvik during 1940 (and along with the Chasseur alpins, Polish troops and Royal Navy helped us a lot in our fight against the Germans there).
Had a teacher once (one of my German language teachers) coming from the mid part of norway who had a friend serving in the Trønder bataljon during the battle for Narvik.
During their entry into the fight at Narvik the French forces placed their liqour and wine depot at a place somewhat further out in the Rombakk fjord from Narvik and Bjerkvik and sort of forgot it there.
Thus when the Legion finaly entered Narvik after a prolonged fight, there was only 2 bottles of whisky (donated by a local doctor) to share between all the men in the unit :D.
When the fighting at Narvik stopped, after the Allies pulled out and the Norwegian armed forces elements still under arms in Norway laid down their arms during mid May 1940, the friend of my teacher, like many other Norwegian soldiers in the area, was left to his own devices with regards to his return trip back home.
Thus on his way back home he found the forgotten liquour store of the French units helping us at Narvik, and pinched a casket of rum for himself from there.
Having carried with him that casket all the way from Narvik, with only a few km's to go before reaching his home place, he decided to burry his casket of rum at some spot along the Northern Norway railway line ("Nordlandsbanen" in Norwegian) called Majavatn for more "needy times in the future".
Those "more needy times" came allready during 1942. But when the friend of my teacher came back to the spot along the railway line to dig up his "treasure" again, the Germans had in the meantime built a railway station over it (Majavatn railway station) rofl rofl rofl rofl.
Thus he had to endure the rest of the war without being able to "drown his sorrows with good liqour" rofl rofl rofl rofl :D.

As for the 13th DBLE, they inherited their berets from the Maginot line fortress troops, wasn't it so? And some legionnaires in the unit wore theirs as late as the early post WW-2 years in Indochina?

[fantassin]

That's a good story...

Yes, the small berets were also used by the "Troupes de Forteresse" of the North-East part of the Maginot line as part of the "Tenue 1935".

The units located in the Alps part of the Maginot Line wore the "Alpin" type, both in "kaki foncé" colour, i.e dark green (kaki means olive green, not tan, in French).

In one of his books, Pierre Sergent who was a Pn leader in the 1er BEP in Indochina and the CO of 2eme Compagnie du 1er REP in Algeria before joining the OAS clandestine organization after the "putsh" in Algeria, explains that officers imagined all sorts of berets in the early days of the FFL para units (May 1948) in order to mix the red of the airborne and the then not very well established yet green of the legion.

Some, for fun, proposed a mix of the two colours in circles or bolts of lightning....finally, they went for the green of the legion with the airborne badge. It remains like that to this day.

[afrographX]

is the video on french or english?

[OldRecon]

is the video on french or english?

It's in French.
And though I don't understand a word of French (allmost) its a beautiful vid. all the same. :)

[OldRecon]

And the sequence towards the end of the allmost beheaded ex-prisoner of the Japanese showing off his neckscar is a very interesting shot.
And that AMX-13 spiking the gun of their charge in the ditch is hilarious rofl rofl rofl (though I would not have liked to be thrown about inside a tank in such a short stop).

[OldRecon]

Some more pictures from the Algerian war:


Soldiers from "Commando Jaubert" (another Commando du chasse)
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie1grand.jpg


Also soldiers apparently belonging to a Commando du chasse unit
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie2grand.jpg


EBR from 1er and S-58 chopper
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie3grand.jpg


Soldier belonging to HQ Coy of 3. RCP (the unit led by Col. Bigeard during the Algerian war?)
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie5grand.jpg


Yet another pic of soldiers belonging to 3. RCP
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie4grand.jpg

Paras with 2 slain fellagah (somewhat graphic though one of the more well known photos from the conflict) (http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie6grand.jpg)


Another pic of legionnaires on operations with kepi "on top" :D
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie7grand.jpg


Another group of legionnaires, this time without kepi :D (the caporal (?) on the right of the picture incidentaly looks very similar to legionnaire in illustration shown underneath)
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie8grand.jpg
http://www.legion-etrangere-parachutiste.com/dessin/dessin22.jpg


Paras on the march
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie10grand.jpg


This pic have allready been posted before I think under another thread, but the countryside in this pic is so stunningly beautiful I just couldn't resist posting it once more :)
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie14grand.jpg


Patrol on the march. Doesn't look like paras this time (plain colour uniforms)
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie17grand.jpg


Cordon stop deployed along track
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/histoire-militaire/photos/algerie18grand.jpg