French unit sizes as an indication of casualites they have taken in the war

[Olefin]

I agree with you there James - i.e. they make the 1st back into a combat unit and move the administrative elements to possibly the 4th regiment which was a training regiment - so now its responsible for both administration and training.

They could use some of the NCO's and officers from the original 1st as the officers and men for the "new" 1st Regiment.

One reason could be the big casualties that the other regiments took - i.e. they needed more punch in the field so they added a new regiment to give the Legion more combat punch.

By the way - another idea could be they convert one of the Engineering Regiments to a combat one and then rename it from Engineering to Infantry.