1er REC: 2022 Commando Training Center | French Foreign Legion Information

See a new, awesome video clip dedicated to the Commando Training Center of the Foreign Legion’s 1st Foreign Cavalry Regiment (1er REC), currently the only such training facility run within the Foreign Legion.

The Commando Training and Hardening Center (Centre d’Instruction et d’Aguerrissement Commando, CIAC) of the 1er REC is located in the south of France, close to Marseille. It was created as part of the practice of “relentless” hardening and training of the “warrior spirit” of the Foreign Legion men, and became operational a year earlier, in late May 2021.

The new training center consists of three parts: an amphibious one, which is placed at calanque (a narrow) of Port-Miou in Cassis, east of Marseille. The second part is at Fort Montrose, an old fortress located south of Marseille. And the third part is found at Camp Carpiagne, the regiment’s military base and a large military training area in one, also not far from the second largest city of France.

The operational readiness course takes 13 days in total. It comprises a 10-day phase of acquiring basic know-how in the fields of overcoming obstacles and in (close) combat, which is followed by a 72-hour tactical know-how practice, including infiltration in a maritime environment and then on land at night, vertical crossing, combat, guerilla tactics and tactical withdrawal. Upon the course, the participants receive the CIAC 1er REC badge.

Since December 2021, the center has been open to other Foreign Legion units, too. Thus, we can see men from the 4th Company, 2e REI participating in the clip, along their comrades from the 1er REC, 13e DBLE, and the 1er REG. They train all together within a single detachment.

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