The Expendables: Life in the French Foreign Legion (2012) | Hacker News Reader

The Expendables: Life in the French Foreign Legion (2012)

vanityfair.com

71 pointsjohnny31315 comments

Been a few posts about the foreign legion here recently. Are people thinking about alternatives to sitting at a desk? It seems like the most extreme counter.

I have found another French invention to do the job (of providing a break from the desk) without the brutal sides of deployed army life: Parkour. It's got it all: Exercise for the whole body, fresh air, multi-sensory interaction with your physical surroundings which really seems to help get the brain back in a more healthy mode than after a few days in front of a monitor.

I think for former criminals who have finished serving their time, the Foreign Legion would be a chance for a fresh start if they chose to keep the new identity that the Foreign Legion assigns to them.

That's largely a thing of the past. You're more likely to be handed over to Interpol than anything else today.

Also, HN-ers beware -- the FFL doesn't take people without military experience, anymore.

That doesn't seem to be true: https://www.legion-recrute.com/mdl/pages.php?id=2&titre=Les-...

In practice, it is true. They have a long line of candidates, and will prefer those with experience.

Source: am a reserve infantryman at 94th RI, 3rd Company. Regularly train with 2ème REP.

> former criminals who have finished serving their time

I would imagine US soldiers with blemished pasts would be candidates

It seems a lot of these volunteer armies are treated not just as expendable, but as a way to remove undesirables from society.

Brought to mind the slaughter of the Donbass volunteer battalions. Russian volunteers "holidaying" in Ukraine or Syria also seem to be just as expendable and similarly include elements of neo-nazis and criminals offered deals.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2014/09/06/anatomy-of-a-bloodbath/

That was a great read.

Certainly removes any romantic notions about the Legion and its place in French society.

If you're keen to remove the romance I can recommend 'Marching with the Devil' by David Mason. It's a raw first-hand account of the Legion during the late 80s and describes the author's boyhood dream of joining vs the reality of his situation in the Legion.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11683362-marching-with-t...

I remember reading that they were used to clean up the sites of French nuclear tests. Not very romantic...

I met a guy in 90s who went through it - hardly remember anything but a story from some remote jungle about a friend who was on a guard during night, and they found him headless in the morning. Suddenly the military didn't appear to this boy so much...

Funnily enough, the Legion étrangère is not a romantic thing at all in France. I have in fact always found it odd that it was even a topic, mostly for Americans to be honest.

I think that owes a lot to Hollywood depictions, as the article mentions.

I was living in N’djamena, Tchad and there was a restaurant called Le Central on the main boulevard that officers from the Legion used to frequent. I was sitting at a nearby table finishing my bottle of Gala beer when they started to sing. I can’t remember the exact words, but it was one of the saddest laments that I have ever heard, essentially refraining that “I will die and you will never know my name. I fight, not for France, but for my brothers in the Legion.”

They had no romantic illusions about their service.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com