The Foreign Legion Algerian Motorized Group (GPLEA) was a short-lived motorized infantry unit that served during the Algerian War (1954–1962). The group comprised three motorized companies that maintained order in eastern Algeria. The GPLEA was disbanded in October 1956, and its companies were absorbed into the 2nd Foreign Infantry Regiment (2e REI).
—
L'article en français : GPLEA : Groupement Porté de Légion Etrangère d’Algérie
—
The 6th Battalion 1er REI, 1954–1955
By August 1954, the Indochina War (1946–1954) was over. But in French North Africa (Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria), another war against France was just beginning. To respond swiftly to the rebel activity, the government would form new Foreign Legion units over the following months. Among them, the very first fully motorized infantry battalion was to be created within the 1st Foreign Infantry Regiment (1er REI): the 6th Battalion, heir to a prestigious history.
The new battalion was to consist of three motorized companies, highly mobile infantry units whose men were transported in light vehicles. They were, in fact, an evolution of the mounted companies (elite units mounted on mules). Some English-language authors translate porté as “mobile,” which is misleading, since the mounted companies were also considered highly mobile. The distinction in French military terminology lies in how the troops were transported: in mounted companies (compagnies montées), the men relied on animals (mules), while in motorized companies (compagnies portées, literally “carried”), they rode in vehicles.
The three companies were formed in western Algeria between November 1954 and January 1955. Command of the 6th Battalion was to go to Major Reppelin, who had commanded the 3rd Battalion, 5th Foreign Infantry Regiment (5e REI), in Indochina in 1952–1953. However, owing to a shortage of Legion officers and NCOs in French North Africa (most of the Legion was still in Indochina at the time), it proved impossible to form an adequate staff for the new unit. The three semi-autonomous companies were therefore designated “fictitious” units (unités fictives), since their parent battalion existed only on paper, and were placed directly under the Legion’s headquarters.
Interestingly, the men serving in the three motorized companies were entitled to wear the fourragère (a braided cord worn on the left shoulder as a collective unit decoration) in the colors of the ribbon of the Croix de Guerre des TOE (War Cross for Overseas Theaters of Operations), which had been awarded to the former 6th Battalion, 1er REI. That battalion had earned the decoration for its actions in Morocco in 1925–1926, during the Rif War. This privilege, however, would last only a few weeks. Incidentally, in 2019, today’s 1st Foreign Regiment (1er RE) inherited the same fourragère from its former 6th Battalion. This was an exception to the usual rule: a regiment does not normally inherit the honors of one of its subordinate units, and tradition is passed down only the other way around.
In late June 1955, the Legion’s headquarters underwent a complete reorganization. The 6th Battalion was abolished, and its three existing motorized companies (the 21st, 22nd, and 23rd)* became independent units:
- 21st Foreign Legion Motorized Company (21e CPLE)
- 22nd Foreign Legion Motorized Company (22e CPLE)
- 23rd Foreign Legion Motorized Company (23e CPLE)
* In the French Army, companies were traditionally numbered consecutively throughout the regiment, with four numbers reserved for each battalion: companies 1–4 belonged to the 1st Battalion, 5–8 to the 2nd Battalion, and so on. The 6th Battalion’s companies were therefore numbered 21 to 24. Fourth companies were formed not so often, owing to a chronic shortage of manpower.
The CPLEs and the GPLEA in Algeria, 1955–1956
Initially, the companies were equipped with M2/M3 half-tracks and M3 scout cars. However, most of these would later be exchanged for vehicles better suited to desert terrain. Each newly independent company then consisted of an HQ platoon, three motorized platoons (each with five Dodge 6×6 trucks), and an armored car platoon with five M8 armored cars (designated AM-M8 in French service). A Dodge WC-56 command car or Jeeps were used by the captain and the platoon leaders, and several American GMC trucks and a few half-tracks usually rounded out the company, which numbered about 150 men.
The companies took part in operations in the mountainous regions of eastern Algeria, the Aurès and Nementcha mountains, and along the Tunisian border, where rebel activity was the most frequent and the most serious. From time to time, they were attached to a temporary combined-arms task force. It was not until early 1956, however, that the decision was made to bring the three units together in a single independent formation.
Accordingly, on February 1, 1956, the Foreign Legion Algerian Motorized Group (Groupement porté de Légion étrangère d’Algérie, GPLEA) was created. A battalion-sized formation, the new group’s purpose was to unite the three motorized companies scattered across eastern Algeria, which until then had been independent units in their own right.
In reality, it was a partial revival of the earlier idea of a motorized battalion and, at the same time, an attempt to create a sister unit in Algeria to the Foreign Legion Moroccan Motorized Group (GPLEM). Nevertheless, the GPLEA faced the same administrative problems as its predecessor, the 6th Battalion, 1er REI.
Under Major Marcel Calvin, the GPLEA’s temporary headquarters staff was set up in Djelfa, which had been the 22e CPLE’s rear base since September 1955. The town lies in the center of the country, at the foot of the Saharan Atlas, the mountain range that separates Algeria’s high plateaus from the Sahara.
On May 1, 1956, command of the GPLEA was given to Lieutenant Colonel Jean Rossi, who had been the commanding officer of the 13th Foreign Legion Demi-Brigade (13e DBLE) until April. Also in May, Captain Magnas of the 23e CPLE left his company to join the staff of the new group.
The companies then lost their independence and, by administrative decision, became the 21st, 22nd, and 23rd Motorized Companies of the GPLEA.
By the second half of 1956, the group’s units were already wearing the Saharan uniform at ceremonies, with its characteristic seroual (wide, baggy trousers) decorated on the side with the Agadez cross, a symbol of the Tuareg of the Sahara.
However, the group’s existence was very short. A few months later, in response to the independence of Morocco and Tunisia in March 1956, the return of all its units from the Far East, and the worsening situation in Algeria, the Legion was reorganized once again. The two motorized groups, along with their companies scattered across Algeria and Morocco, were to be integrated into larger regiments: the GPLEA into the 2e REI, and the GPLEM into the 4th Foreign Infantry Regiment (4e REI). Their companies would form new groups within these two regiments, which became the Legion’s first “motorized regiments.”
In October 1956, after its brief existence, the GPLEA was therefore disbanded, and its elements were absorbed into the 2e REI. The 21st, 22nd, and 23rd Motorized Companies of the GPLEA thus became the 4th, 5th, and 6th Motorized Companies, 2e REI. Together, they formed Motorized Company Group No. 2 (GCP 2), one of the two company groups that made up the reorganized regiment.
In March 1957, with their sand-colored vehicles and Saharan-style djellabas (hooded robes), the three motorized companies of the former GPLEA, nicknamed the “Yellow Devils,” handed over their quarters to the motorized companies of the 4e REI. They then crossed Algeria from east to west to join the 2e REI, at the time based in Aïn Sefra, where two of them had originally been formed.
For the sake of completeness, one more independent motorized company should be mentioned: the 24th Foreign Legion Motorized Company (24e CPLE). It was formed in August 1955 to operate in the sands of western Algeria, along the Moroccan border. Far removed from its sister units, however, it became the 4th Legion Saharan Motorized Company (4e CSPL) in January 1956, the last of the Legion’s Saharan motorized companies to be formed, and so never became part of the GPLEA. The company would remain independent until 1963.
———
———
Main information sources:
Képi blanc magazine
Foreign Legion annual bulletins (1950s)
J. Brunon, G.-R. Manue, P. Carles: Le Livre d’Or de la Légion (Charles-Lavauzelle, 1976)
P. Cart-Tanneur, Tibor Szecsko: Le 4ème Etranger (Editions B.I.P., 1987)
Tibor Szecsko: Le grand livre des insignes de la Légion étrangère (S.I.H.L.E., 1991)
———
More from the Foreign Legion’s history:
97th Division Reconnaissance Group
1st Legion Saharan Motorized Company
Foreign Legion Repair Platoons in Africa
GOLE: Foreign Legion Operational Group
———
The page was updated on: October 15, 2026