Une station du 48e régiment de Transmissions d'Agen
The Signals Department
Background
The signals branch of the armed
services is the department in charge of effecting the contacts
and communications necessary for command and the deployment
of units and the various resources they require.
In the French armed forces, the signals department was
created in June 1942, during the Second World War. The signals
department played a strategic role in the Resistance, by
communicating to London , in particular, vital military information
about the disposition, location and movements of the occupation
troops.
The wireless operators - background soldiers - thus accomplished
an extremely risky mission as those of them who were discovered
then used to be considered as spies, turned in to the Gestapo
and often, after long exasperating questioning, executed
without any trial.
Signals units accompanied and served the Free French Forces
all through the various campaigns that led to the liberation
of Europe , right up to 1945.
From 1949 to 1954, signals companies, including a parachutists
company, participated in operations during the Indochina
War and right up to the Dien Bien Phu battle. Their fate
was not different from that of the other units involved in
operations.
From 1955 to 1962, signals units deployed on the whole
territory of Algeria , served in all the military operations
and also participated in the Suez expedition of 1956.
Since then, the signals department, having been assimilated
into all major military dispositions, continued executing
its missions within the framework of OPEX (overseas operations),
such as in the Gulf during the 1990 War, the Central African
Republic, Chad, Lebanon, Cambodia, Somalia, Rwanda, former
Yugoslavia, Albania, Afghanistan, Côte d’Ivoire
(Ivory Coast) and Congo, just to name a few.
At the supreme level, the Army Headquarters has a joint
signals and telecommunications centre, capable of monitoring
more than one operations ground at the same time.
At the unit or division level, the signals department is
often divided into companies associated with the various
officers at operations grounds.
At the regiment, battalion or company level, the signals
service is the duty of sparks « a corps of troops »,
endowed with specially designed equipment, trained by experts
from the signals department, and constitute an integral part
of the unit concerned.
Installation d'une station satellite
he Advanced Practicing School of Signals Ecole Supérieure
et d’Application des Transmissions (ESAT) is based
in Rennes , while signals regiments and companies are found
nationwide and in overseas operations grounds where they are
deployed.