An Italian Legionnaire’s Photo Journey Through the Legion, 1987–1992

Summer is traditionally a quiet season for Legion news, but a nice photo slideshow is well worth a look while things wind down. Posted on YouTube by an Italian former legionnaire, the video takes viewers through his five years of service in the French Foreign Legion, from August 1987 to August 1992, most of it spent with the 2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment (2e REP).

Like every legionnaire, he began his journey at the 4th Foreign Regiment (4e RE), the Legion’s training regiment based in Castelnaudary, completing his basic instruction with the 3rd Company of Enlisted Volunteers (3e CEV) in the newly constructed barracks. He then stayed on at 4e RE for another year as a Fut-fut — Legion slang for a freshly qualified legionnaire who, having just finished the four-month basic training himself, takes on responsibility for the next intake of recruits while racing to complete the Corporal’s course. He did that course at Caserne Lapasset, the old barracks in the town’s center, that had been occupied by the regiment before transferring to the new ones.

From there, he joined the 2e REP on the island of Corsica, where he served in the Heavy Mortar Platoon (SML — a unit disbanded in the 1990s and re-created in 2024) within the Reconnaissance and Support Company (CEA). After earning his NCO stripes, he moved within the same company to its Reconnaissance Platoon (known at the time as SER, today the SRR), where he saw out the remainder of his contract.

The legionnaire deployed to Djibouti in the Horn of Africa two times.

At 2:10 we may notice then-Captain Eberle (on the left), a German legionnaire who joined the Legion in 1965 and left it in 2002, as a lieutenant colonel. He commanded the 3e CEV 4e RE from 1986 to 1988.

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