| No turning back
| Practical requirements | Psychological
preparation |
No
turning back
Has Jean-Claude Van Damme’s performance
in the film Legionnaire
convinced you that life in the desert is all high octane adventure?
Or perhaps the story Beau Geste
has seduced you into believing that joining the Foreign Legion is
a romantic and noble thing to do. Then take a minute to make absolutely
sure. After all, you don’t want join the hundreds of men who
realise too late that the Legion is not for them. All successful
applicants are signed up for a minimum of five years, so there’s
no changing your mind.
One of the Legion’s biggest problems is that
each year hundreds of legionnaires are willing to risk a court martial
and a genuine life on the run by deserting. So ask yourself this:
do you really want to spend the next five years of your life constantly
being bawled at and treated like dirt? Could you really face spending
every waking moment surrounded by mercenaries, ex-convicts and unruly,
public-school delinquents? And, worse, if it comes down to it, you
will have to entrust your life to these people.
To be absolutely sure you know what you are letting
yourself in for, here are a couple of checklists that might help
you prepare before you go.
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Practical requirements
• You must be aged between 18 and 40, although
17-year-olds can join with parental permission. You also have to
be unmarried and male. An announcement made by a French defence
official in 2000 that women would be allowed to serve in all functions
of the French army was quickly corrected by Foreign Legion officials.
The Legion, it turns out, was the one exception.
• The common language of the Legion is, understandably
French. But you don’t need to be able to speak French when
you join, since this is drummed into legionnaires as part of the
basic training. Even so, it is a good idea to learn as much as you
can beforehand.
• A general guideline for physical fitness is
that if you can do 30 press-ups, 50 sit-ups, 8 chin-ups, climb a
6-metre rope without using your feet and run 8 kilometres with a
12-kilogram rucksack in less than one hour, then you’re pretty
safe. You don’t have to be able to do all this but it will
certainly help you get through the training. The two most important
physical requirements are running and upper body strength. Legionnaires
run pretty much everywhere, so it will help to prepare by doing
the same. And when legionnaires are not running, they're marching.
They have one of the most intolerably slowest marches in the military,
at about 88 steps per minute. Although the Legion's motto 'March
or die' is no longer meant literally, it is still used; particularly
during some of the 160-kilometre training marches. Upper body strength
can take time to build up but it’s important in the Legion
because you will be expected to climb a rope using just your hands
in order to finish basic training. So get practising those pull-ups
and press-ups.
• Don’t take anything you value with
you, you won’t be allowed to keep it during your service.
The only things you are allowed to keep are: a French-to-English
dictionary, cigarettes, shaving gear and other toiletry items, a
towel, a watch, a wallet with no more than €20 and an address
book or personal contact list.
• In contrast to older traditions, you do now
need to provide valid identification to join the Legion, since there
are many nations from which it will not accept applicants. In fact,
besides presenting your passport, you may, depending upon where
you come from, have to produce a valid visa as well. Ex-convicts
may be accepted provided the offence is minor, but there are no
guarantees.
• You might want to think about preparing a
last will and testament before signing the dotted line.
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Psychological preparation
Practical issues aside, the real preparation is mental.
If you are to survive the training, let alone the remainder of the
five-year contract, it helps to be psychologically prepared and
to know what will be expected of you. As the legionnaires put it,
'It is 10% physical and 90% mental'. Given that the physical requirements
are enough to make grown men cry what does that tell you about the
mental psychological prowess needed to survive the training? The
following checklist may help you decide whether you are up to the
challenge.
• If you have a girlfriend or boyfriend, dump
them! Having someone back home waiting is more likely to hinder
than help you. Rather than becoming a focus and something to work
towards, there is a danger that thoughts of your partner could quickly
come to symbolise everything you are missing out on.
• Are you optimistic? Having a positive outlook
could make all the difference in the desert. Could you be buried
up to your neck in the sand and still remain upbeat?
• If you are easily offended don't even think
about signing up. The training regiment is extremely brutal and
designed to pummel you into submission and wear you down through
sheer cruelty. As the Legion’s mantra puts it: 'Pain is just
weakness leaving your body'. So if you find it impossible to ignore
racism, homophobia and bigotry then the Legion could become a nightmare
for you.
• Despite the stereotype that legionnaires are
all on the run, joining the Legion to escape your personal demons
or to leave your past behind is a mistake. It helps to come from
a position of strength and confidence. Either go in sure about who
you are, or be willing to submit to the challenge and learn from
it.
• There may still be a place for truly desperate
fugitives eager to escape their past, provided they are willing
to conform to the Legion’s rules.
• Being in control of your emotions is a valuable
asset in the Legion. Much of the training is about finding a weakness
in the recruits, so it is often important and helpful if you can
skilfully conceal your emotions.
• Rebels and out-and-out mavericks need not
apply. An extremely important part of the Legion is to follow rules,
and there are a lot of them. If you can’t cope with this sort
of authority, your life will be an absolute misery during your stay
– and you’re sure to end up a fugitive.
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