|
The Spanish Legion (Spanish: Legión Española or simply La Legión), formerly Spanish Foreign Legion, is an elite unit of the Spanish Army. Founded as the Tercio de Extranjeros ("Foreigners Regiment"), it was originally intended as a Spanish equivalent of the French Foreign Legion.
History The Spanish Foreign Legion was formed by royal decree of King Alfonso XIII on January 28, 1920 with the Minister of War José Villalba stating, "With the designation of Foreigners Regiment there will be created an armed military unit, whose recruits, uniform and regulations by which they should be governed will be set by the minister of war." Historicly there had been a Spanish Foreign Legion which proceded the modern Legion's formation in 1920.On 28 June 1835,the French government had decided to hand over to the Spanish government, lock, stock, and barrel, a former French Legion in support of Queen Isabella's claim to the Spanish throne during the First Carlist War with around 4,000 men landed at Tarragona on 17 August .This being the First Spanish Legion until The Legion was dissolved on 8 December 1838, when it had dropped to only 500 men.The Spanish Foreign Legion was created along the lines of the French Foreign Legion as a corps of professional troops that could replace conscripts in colonial campaigns. In 1920 Spain was facing a major rebellion in the Protectorate of Spanish Morocco, led by the able Rif leader Abd el Krim. On September 2 of that same year, King Alfonso XIII conferred command of the new regiment on Lieutenant Colonel of Infantry José Millán Astray, chief proponent of its establishment. Millán Astray was an able soldier but an eccentric and extreme personality. His style and attitude would become part of the mystique of the Legion. On September 20 the first recruit joined the new Legion; this date is celebrated yearly. The initial make-up of the regiment was that of a headquarters unit and three battalions (known as Banderas, or "flags"). Each battalion was in turn made up of a headquarters company, two rifle companies and a machine gun company. The regiment's initial location was at the Cuartel del Rey en Ceuta on the Plaza de Colón. At its height, during the Spanish Civil War, the legion consisted of 18 banderas, plus a tank bandera, an assault engineer bandera and a Special Operations Group. Banderas 12 through 18 were considered independent units and never served as part of the tercios. Francisco Franco was one of the founding members of the Legion and the unit's second-in-command. The Legion fought in Morocco in the War of the Rif (to 1926). Together with the Regulares (Moorish colonial troops), the Legion made up the Spanish Army of Africa. In 1934 both units of the Legion and the Regulares were brought to Spain by the new Republican Government to help put down a workers revolt in Asturias. Under the leadership of Lieutenant Colonel Juan Yagüe the Army of Africa played an important part in the Spanish Civil War on the Nationalist side. The professionalism of both the Legion and the Regulares gave Franco's Nationalists a significant initial advantage over the less well trained Republican forces. The Army of Africa remained the elite spearhead of the Nationalist armies throughout the Civil War. Following the Nationalist victory in 1939, the Legion was reduced in size and returned to its bases in Spanish Morocco. When Morocco gained its independence in 1956 the Legion continued in existence as part of the garrison of the remaining Spanish enclaves and territories in North Africa. On June 17, 1970, legion units opened fire and killed eleven pro-independence demonstrators at the Zemla quarters of El-Aaiun in the Western Sahara, (then still the Spanish Sahara). The incident, which came to be called the Zemla Intifada, had a significant influence on pushing the Sahrawi anticolonial movement into embrarking on an armed struggle which still goes on up to the present, though Spain has long since abandoned the territory and handed it over to Morocco. Through the course of the Legion's history Spaniards (including natives of the colony of Spanish Guinea) have made up the majority of its members, with foreigners accounting for 25 percent or less. During the Riff War of the early 1920s most of the Foreigners serving with the Legion were Spanish speaking Latin Americans. After 1987 it stopped accepting foreigners altogether and changed its name to the Spanish Legion. In the 2000s, after the abandonment of conscription, the Spanish Army is again accepting foreigners from select nationalities. The Legion today accepts native Spanish speakers (mostly from Central and South America, but even from countries like Germany) between ages of 18 and 28, be they male or female. In recent years the Spanish Legion was involved in Bosnia as part of the SFOR. It also took part in the Iraq War, deploying in Najaf alongside El Salvadorean troops, until the new Spanish government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero fulfilled its electoral promises by withdrawing Spanish troops from Iraq. The Legion units deployed in Iraq were involved in several combats against the insurgency. In 2005 the Legion was deployed in Afghanistan as part of the NATO-led International Stabilisation Force (ISAF). Esprit de corps
Famous ex-Legionnaires Present day The Spanish Legion nowadays is mostly used in NATO peacekeeping missions. It currently numbers 5,000 in a Brigade of two tercios (regiments). It is directly controlled by the Spanish General Staff. The Spanish Legion is currently deployed mainly in the Spanish African enclaves, namely Ceuta, Melilla but also in Ronda and Almería in Andalusia. Although the detachment at Málaga was transferred away, every Holy Week a platoon of legionnaires disembarks to procession the Christ of the Legion, a figure of a cruficied Jesus, venerated by the Legion. The Legion remains a harshly disciplined elite unit. Training is still brutal with punishments often involving severe beatings by NCOs. The Legion has a special operations unit known as the Bandera de Operaciones Especiales de la Legión (Legion Special Operations Unit, BOEL) which consists of about 500 men trained in various different areas: Notes See also | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
|
| |