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The French Foreign Legion is an elite corps of the French Army that consists of several specialties: infantry, cavalry, engineers, and airborne troops. It was created in 1831 to allow foreign nationals into the French Army. It formed part of the Armée d’Afrique, the French Army's units associated with France's colonial project in North Africa, until the end of the Algerian War in 1962.
A hussar was a member of a class of light cavalry, originating in Central Europe (Hungary) during the 15th and 16th centuries. The title and distinctive dress of these horsemen were subsequently widely adopted by light cavalry regiments in European armies during the late 17th and 18th centuries. By the 19th century, hussars were wearing jackets decorated with braid plus shako or busby fur hats and had developed a romanticized image of being dashing and adventurous.
Foreign Legion most often refers to:
Uhlan is a type of light cavalry, primarily armed with a lance. The uhlans started as Lithuanian irregular cavalry, that were later also adopted by other countries during the 18th century, including Poland, France, Russia, Prussia, Saxony, and Austria-Hungary. The term "lancer" was often used interchangeably with "uhlan"; the lancer regiments later formed for the British Army were directly inspired by the uhlans of other armies.
A carabinier is in principle a soldier armed with a carbine, musket, or rifle, which became commonplace by the beginning of the Napoleonic Wars in Europe. The word is derived from the identical French word carabinier.
The Flight of the Wild Geese was the departure of an Irish Jacobite army under the command of Patrick Sarsfield from Ireland to France, as agreed in the Treaty of Limerick on 3 October 1691, following the end of the Williamite War in Ireland. More broadly, the term Wild Geese is used in Irish history to refer to Irish soldiers who left to serve in continental European armies in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries.
The Polish Army is the name applied to the military forces of Poland. The name has been in use since the early 19th century, although it can be used to refer to earlier formations as well. Polish Armed Forces consist of the Army, Navy and Air Force branches and are under the command of the Ministry of National Defense.
The Coalition forces of the Napoleonic Wars were composed of Napoleon Bonaparte's enemies: the United Kingdom, the Austrian Empire, Kingdom of Prussia, Kingdom of Spain, Kingdom of Naples, Kingdom of Sicily, Kingdom of Sardinia, Dutch Republic, Russian Empire, the Ottoman Empire, Kingdom of Portugal, Kingdom of Sweden, and various German and Italian states at differing times in the wars. At their height, the Coalition could field formidable combined forces of about 1,740,000 strong. This outnumbered the 1.1 million French soldiers. The breakdown of the more active armies are: Austria, 570,000; Britain, 250,000; Prussia, 300,000; and Russia, 600,000.
The Polish Legions were several Polish military units that served with the French Army in the Napoleonic era, mainly from 1797 to 1803, although some units continued to serve until 1815.
The Armenian Legion was a volunteer unit that was raised by the Allied Powers to serve in the Middle East Theatre during World War I. Trained and led by French army commanders, the Légion d'Orient, as the unit was originally known, was created in 1916, its ranks chiefly drawn from Levantine and Armenian exiles and refugees from the Ottoman Empire. In 1919, it was renamed the Légion Arménienne.
The Foreign Legion has had a long and unique history amongst the units of the French Army. It was historically formed of expatriate enlisted personnel led by French officers. Founded by a royal ordinance issued by King Louis Philippe of France on March 9, 1831, with the aim of bolstering the strength of the French Army while also finding a use for the influx of refugees inundating France at the time. The Foreign Legion subsequently found a permanent home in the ranks of the French military. The Foreign Legion's history spans across the Conquest of Algeria, the Franco-Prussian War, numerous colonial exploits, both World Wars, the First Indochina War, and the Algerian War.
The Legion of the Vistula was a unit of Poles in the service of Napoleonic France, one of the larger Polish legions of the Napoleonic period.
The British Army during the Napoleonic Wars experienced a time of rapid change. At the beginning of the French Revolutionary Wars in 1793, the army was a small, awkwardly administered force of barely 40,000 men. By the end of the period, the numbers had vastly increased. At its peak, in 1813, the regular army contained over 250,000 men. The British infantry was "the only military force not to suffer a major reverse at the hands of Napoleonic France."
The British Colonial Auxiliary Forces were the various military forces of Britain's colonial empire which were not considered part of the British Army proper.
2nd Regiment may refer to:
Several military units have been known as the Belgian Legion. The term "Belgian Legion" can refer to Belgian volunteers who served in the French Revolutionary Wars, Napoleonic Wars, Revolutions of 1848 and, more commonly, the Mexico Expedition of 1867.
Among the approximately one million foreign volunteers and conscripts who served in the Wehrmacht during World War II were ethnic Belgians, Czechs, Dutch, Finns, Danes, French, Hungarians, Norwegians, Poles, Portuguese, Swedes, Swiss along with people from Great Britain, Ireland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and the Balkans. At least 47,000 Spaniards served in the Blue Division.
The Georgian National Legion or Georgian Legion is a military unit formed by mostly ethnic Georgian volunteers fighting on the side of Ukraine in the war in Donbas and the Russo-Ukrainian War. The unit was organized in 2014, and in 2016 it was made part of the Ukrainian Army, under the 25th Mechanized Infantry Battalion "Kyiv Rus". On 15 June 2024, the unit was classified as a terrorist organization by the Russian government.
The International Legion Defence of Ukraine, or the Ukrainian Foreign Legion, is a military unit of the Ukrainian Ground Forces of composed of foreign volunteers. It was created on 27 February 2022 by the Ukrainian government at the request of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to fight against the Russian invasion of the country. It was originally part of the Territorial Defense Forces, under the name of International Legion of Territorial Defence of Ukraine, eventually transitioning to the command of the Ukrainian Ground Forces at some point in its existence.
References
- ↑ Grasmeder, Elizabeth M.F. "Leaning on Legionnaires: Why Modern States Recruit Foreign Soldiers". International Security . Retrieved 30 July 2021.
