Paul Arnaud de Foïard

Infobox Military Person
name=Paul Arnaud de Foïard


caption=
born=9 September 1921
died=7 August 2005
placeofbirth=Meudon, France
placeofdeath=Nérac, France
nickname=
allegiance=France
branch=French Army
serviceyears=1941-1981
rank=Général de corps d’armée
unit=
commands=2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment
11th Parachute Division
battles=World War II
First Indochina War
Algerian War
awards=
relations=
laterwork=

Paul Marie Félix Jacques René Arnaud de Foïard (9 September 1921 – 7 August 2005) was a French Army general, he took part in World War II, First Indochina War and Algerian War.

Biography

He joined the French Resistance at twenty. Imprisoned, he managed to escape and join the Free French Forces. He joined for the duration of the war and was posted to the 501st Tank Regiment.

He was posted as an aspirant to the 3rd Battalion, Foreign Legion Marsch Regiment on 1 April 1944. He landed in Southern France and took part in offensive of the First French Army, during which he was wounded. He was leader of a section in Germany and received the médaille militaire in 1945.

Assinged to the 3rd Foreign Infantry Regiment, he takes part in the reconquest of French Indochina where he was wounded a second time. He was made Knight of the Légion d'honneur in 1947; he volunteered to serve as section leader in the parachute company of the 3rd Foreign Infantry Regiment in 1948.

Promoted to captain in 1952, he took command of the 2nd Company of the 1st Battalion, 1st Foreign Regiment in Sidon, Algeria. At the end of his command, he was assigned to the morale service of the Foreign Legion as editor of the Képi blanc magazine in Sidi-Bel-Abbes. He is given command of the 5th Company of the 4th Foreign Regiment in 1955. He then returns to France in 1957 as a part of the Foreign Legion depot. After the Ecole de guerre, he returns to the Foreign Legion at the operation bureau of the 2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment from 1962 to 1963. He took command of the 2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment in 1965 at Bou Sfer and will command it during its move to Calvi, Corsica until 1967.

He commanded the 11th Parachute Division from 1975 to 1977. He retired from active service on 11 September 1981 with the grade of Général de corps d’armée, having commanded the Ecole de guerre in Paris for four years.

Decorations

*Grand Officer of the Légion d'honneur
*Grand Cross of the Ordre national du Mérite
*Médaille militaire (1945)
*Croix de guerre 1939-1945
*Croix de guerre des Théatres d'Opérations Exterieures
*Croix de la Valeur militaire
*Médaille des évadés
*Croix du combattant volontaire 1939-1945
*Croix du combattant
*Médaille coloniale with agrafe « EO »
*Knight of the Ordre des Palmes Académiques
*Médaille de la Jeunesse et des Sports
*Médailles commémoratives « 1939 1945 », « Indochine » and security and order maintning operations in Nord Africa with agrafes « Algérie » and « Maroc ».
*Bronze Star Medal (USA)
*Officer of the Order of Ouissam Alaouite (Morocco)