La Légion marche vers le front (The Legion marches toward the front) is the regimental song of the French Foreign Legion’s 2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment (2e REP), currently the Legion’s only airborne unit.

The song was originally called “Lied der Legion Condor”, composed and written by Wolfram Philipps and Christian Jährig in 1939. It became the official anthem of the Legion Condor, a German air force that fought alongside Nationalists in the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s.

Thereafter, around 1940, the popular song was adopted by German SS and renamed “SS Marschiert in Feindesland”. This song was subsequently translated by members of the Legion of French Volunteers Against Bolshevism (Légion des Volontaires Français, LVF). These men, who included a number of former legionnaires, volunteered for the Eastern Front to fight there against Stalin‘s Soviet Union, alongside Germans. At the time, the song was known under the name “Le Chant du Diable” (The Devil’s Song).

The Foreign Legion adopted the song in the late 1940s, when it accepted some of these French veterans, and modified the lyrics. It became the official song of the 2e BEP in French Indochina (1948-1955), and then inherited by the 2e REP.

By the way, another march of the Legion Condor adopted by the Foreign Legion is Nous sommes tous des volontaires, the official song of the 1st Foreign Regiment (1er RE).

Refrain:
Nous sommes les hommes des troupes d’assaut,
Soldats de la vieille Légion
Demain brandissant nos Drapeaux
En vainqueurs nous défilerons
Nous n’avons pas seulement des armes
Mais le diable marche avec nous.
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, Car nos aînés de la Légion
Se battant là-bas, nous emboîtons le pas.

1.
La Légion marche vers le front
En chantant nous suivons,
Héritiers de ses traditions
Nous sommes avec elles.

2.
Pour ce destin de chevalier,
Honneur, Fidélité,
Nous sommes fiers d’appartenir
Au 2ème REP.

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