The portray of a French Indochina soldier must be one of the most complex one to put together accurately
as it will depend on the unit portrayed and the actual year during the war.
Some of units uniforms remained the same for several years and other (mainly Airborne) evolved yearly during
the 8 years French Indochina war.
WWII French, British, US and then French uniforms equipments and weapons were used at specific time with specific units,
so your own research is vital!
Some of the later French uniforms and equipment were either
TTA “Toute Armes” (all Army branches)
or
TAP “Troupes Aeroportees” (Airborne) only.
You are a man, Go to Indochina to defend liberty
You will become a leader!
French Dog tags (plaque d’identité)
The main dog tag used during the Indochina war was the M1918 wrist type.
This an lozenge shape with rounded corners and breakable in two parts. The information is quite minimal.
On the front first name and surname and incorporation year,
on the back recruiting office name and recruiting register number (not service number)
This is repeated on the lower section
 |  Model 1918 dog tag on matching Military records book and sleeve. The date of incorporation is January 1925. Type used in Indochina |  Model 1950 Date of incorporation is 1955 and the county is Jura. I believe that the GSA stand for “Group Sanguin A” typical of the 50’s no blood Rhesus Type mainly used in Algeria |
Model 18 Dog Tag which would have been used in Indochina (the two tear oval type)
Enlisted/NCO
Front: you would have: date of incorporation in the military followed by the soldier surname and first name, reversed on the lower section
Back: is the recruitment town and his recruiting number for that year, again reverse on lower section.
Officer
Generally:
Front : Officer, followed by surname and first name, again reversed on the lower section
Back: date and town of birth on both section
In 1950 a new dog tag started to be issued, this time it was designed to be hang around the neck and was of an oversize rectangular shape with circular top and bottom shape. Again this was designed to be broken in half with the same information on both parts. Like the earlier model, information was minimum with first name and surname, this time below was your service number. Nothing was on the back of the dog tag.
Despite the fact that most units decided to exhaust stocks of their M1918 dog tags prior to issuing the new model, they started to appear late in Indochina with fresh troops.
The French service numbers were made of two groups of two number the first being the last two digits of your the National Military incorporation year, the second two was the number of your county were the incorporation was done (France is divided in counties all having a two digit number)
and then followed by your recruiting register number.
French army dog tags are only made for troops serving in a war theater,
they were supposed to be kept with the “Livret Militaire” (Army records book) and were only supposed to be issued for combat operations
and returned after until the next operation, this would explained why you don’t always see them.
Due to the size of the M1950 dog tag, they were uncomfortable to wear and it was not uncommon for soldiers not to wear them in the designed place ie around the neck!
“A young NCO having fought in Algeria and then in Tchad pointed out that he used to wear his attached to the inside of his bush hat or on his web belt, the only checks made was to make sure that they were all return after combat operations! “
The “Old Timer” says The 1918 dog tag is the most reprensative for the indochina war, the 1950 model was typical of the Algerian war. Beware, the French introduced a new version in 1993 similar in shape to the model 1950 but this time in a rectangular shape with just the corners rounded. |  |
The information published is to our best knowledge and may be altered if new information is uncovered.
All photos are from our collection and nothing should be re-use without our prior consent! please contact us first.
Uniform and Equipment Standards Team (Alex, Jean-Luc, Jack, Paul )