Coree!

This is coolbert:

"Coree" - - Battle cry of the French Korean battalion.

Here is what happened to the French Korean battalion when it deployed to Vietnam [1954]. That same battalion that fought with great success in Korea [won three U.S. Presidential Unit citations], was defeated with great loss at the hands of the Viet Minh.

Occurring at a place called Mang Yang Pass.

"The Battle of Mang Yang Pass . . . remains as one of the bloodiest defeat of the French Union together with the battle of Dien Bien Phu."

The French Korean battalion. Successful in Korea, NOT SO in Vietnam!! Why is that??

It seems that there were two French Korean battalions participating in the debacle of Mang Yang Pass. These were the 1st and 2nd Korea Battalion.

[both units, having fought as distinct French units in Korea, deployed to Vietnam in 1954. This of course at the time of the truce in Korea!!??]

"The two French Korean battalions, plus the 43rd Battalion de Marche . . . and The 2nd Group of the 10th Colonial Artillery, reduced to fighting as infantry , comprised Groupe Mobile 100."

A continual series of combat actions [primarily ambush] reduced the 1st French Korean battalion [and the rest of Groupe Mobile 100] to a remnant of it's former self:

"the 1st Korea Battalion . . . numbered [ing] about 830 men . . . The survivors [at the end of three weeks of protracted combat], who entered Ban Me Thout the following day, now numbered only 107 men, 53 of whom were wounded. The 1st Korea Battalion had ceased to exist."

Catastrophic losses at the hands of the Viet Minh!!

"In five days of fighting the Korea Regiment had suffered more casualties than in two years of fighting in Korea."


French troops - - good in Korea - - NOT SO in Vietnam!! Why??!!

coolbert.