In the Foreign Legion

by Erwin Rosen

As I have said before, there can be no two opinions about the Foreign Legion. Every one with sound ideas of political economy must agree that it is an unheard-of condition of affairs when a nation is allowed to receive the deserters and criminals—I speak now of that other half of the Foreign Legion—of the States surrounding it, indeed from all the States in the world, with open arms, and to make use of them on principle for a special military organisation. One cannot speak too strongly about this transaction, which is a piece of military blackguardism with something more than despicable about it. And not only the feudalism of the Middle Ages survives in the Foreign Legion but also the morals of those times, when a poor devil enlisted because he did not know of anything better to do with his life: of those times when a deserter was valued because he made a pair of arms and legs the less in the opposing force. In the Foreign Legion's enlistment bureaux a recruit gets a special welcome when he announces that he is a deserter, and is then looked upon as a really valuable addition to the corps. It is also a fact that France offers sanctuary to all criminals who fly from justice. The Foreign Legion will only give up murderers—every other kind of criminal is safe there. And France's selfish reason for this is that she can thereby fill the ranks of a regiment that is always fighting for France and which is always ready to do the hardest work for her in the most unhealthy climates. The average Frenchman has, during the Legion's eighty years of existence, contented himself with attributing the successes of the Foreign Legion to the French flag, and has always looked upon the Foreign Legion as a profitable and patriotic institution. It is only quite of late that the Foreign Legion has come to be looked upon in France as a problem. To-day the Foreign Legion is not an institution that every Frenchman considers quite in the natural order of things. Even the French Ministry of War has busied itself with the "Legion problem." It could not, however, quite make up its mind to give up the Legion. The possibility of employing a soldier who receives five centimes a day, and who can be made use of for all sorts of dangerous undertakings in the worst of climates, is too great a temptation.

Perhaps the real reason for this tenacity is that France, who is so proud of her military traditions, finds it hard to bring herself to dissolve a corps which has been in existence for more than eighty years and which has been led by many a famous general and marshal of France.

It has been suggested that it would be a good idea to change the method of recruiting. Passports should be demanded to make sure that the recruit had not got into trouble with the authorities of his own country. Deserters from the armies of other countries should on no condition be accepted.

There is a diversity of opinion about these suggestions in French military circles. One party asserts that with the deserters the Foreign Legion would lose the flower of its strength, the soldiers who have been trained in other armies. The other side urges that if the pay were raised and the time the men must serve in order to qualify for a pension shortened, the adventurous life in the Foreign Legion and the hope of promotion would always bring more than enough good stuff from all nations for service under the Legion's flag. In these debates the military point of view is the only one of importance and since, considered from this point of view, the Legion has always borne itself splendidly, things have been left as they were. All suggestions for a change in the organisation of the Legion have naturally been made very quietly. All the same the Legion has, of late, come very much before the public in France.

There is no doubt that they are beginning to look at the Foreign Legion a little critically in France. The number of those who doubt that the country is right in keeping up this barbarous institution is growing daily. Referring to the great mutiny of the soldiers of the Legion at Saida, Jaurès wrote in the Humanité:

"The Foreign Legion will doubtless be a source of everlasting difficulty to us; the idea of forming a body of troops for the French army from foreign deserters is at any rate an unusual one."

This is a step in the right direction. They are beginning to talk about the problem of the Foreign Legion. Its existence is no longer considered absolutely natural. The question has been raised. If the Foreign Legion did not exist, and some member of the French parliament were to suggest the formation of a corps of foreign mercenaries, preferably foreign deserters, the suggestion would doubtless be received with indignation. The tactless politician would be sure to be confronted with the somewhat obvious remark that it would be unworthy of the dignity of France to gather a band of foreigners under the tricolour to defend French soil. One would hear some very pretty speeches on the subject. That sort of thing can be tolerated in the Balkan States or in Venezuela or Honduras, but not in our proud France. Some deputy or other would be certain to warn the nation—the warning is a very obvious one—that other States could institute Foreign Legions, filling their ranks with French deserters. Think of the shudder that would pass through the land at the idea of English ships manned by, or German colonies conquered by, French deserters.

… The Foreign Legion lives upon its past. The Frenchman is accustomed to it and hardly notices what an anachronism it is.

The problem of the Legion is so easy. It can be divided into two questions:

Is it fair to pay a man who works really hard a daily wage of five centimes?