Russian Expeditionary Force in France The Russian Expeditionary Force was a World War I military force sent to France by the Russian Empire . In 1915 the French requested that Russian troops be sent to fight alongside their own army on the Western Front . Initially they asked for 300 , 000 men , an absurdly high figure , probably based on their assumptions about Russia ' s ' unlimited ' reserve s . General Mikhail Alekseev , the Imperial Chief of Staff , was opposed to sending any , though Nicholas II finally agreed to send a unit of brigade strength . The First Russian Special Brigade finally landed at Marseille in April 1916 . A Second Special Brigade was also sent to serve alongside other Allied formations on the Salonika Front in northern Greece . In France , the First Brigade served with distinction until the outbreak of the Russian Revolution of 1917 . With Brigade morale being sapped by political agitation , it was finally disbanded before the end of the year . However , some of the more determined formed the Légion Russe ( French for " Russian Legion " ) , and continued to preserve a Russian presence in the west and , indeed , in the Great War itself , right up until the Armistice in November , 1918 . Before March 1917 . In December 1915 , Paul Doumer , on a visit to Russia , proposed that 300 , 000 troops be sent to France in exchange for munitions . While the Russian high command was not enthusiastic about this proposal , Czar Nicholas II was . General Alexeyev , the chief of staff , made an offer to send Russian troops to France , as long as the Russian troops were overseen by Russian officers operating under the French High Command , and that the French Navy must equip and transport them . The 1st Russian Special Brigade was formed in January , 1916 , led by General Lokhvitsky . It was composed of the 1st and 2nd regiments , from Moscow and Samara respectively . The Brigade was formed mostly by reserve units , with the 1st regiment ' s troops mainly being factory workers and the 2nd ' s mainly being peasants , with a total of 8 , 942 men . It left Moscow on February 3 , 1916 and arrived in Marseille on April 16 of the same year . The 3rd , 4th and 5th Brigades soon followed . The 2nd and 4th Brigades arrived in the Salonika front in August and November 1916 . The 3rd Brigade was made up mostly of professional soldiers and reserve units formed in Yekaterinburg and Chelyabinsk and left for France in August 1916 . General Aleksei Brusilov was responsible for the 4 Special Brigades which contributed a total of 44 , 319 men to the war in France . The 6th , 7th and 8th Brigades were never formed because of the Russian Revolution . Approximately 450 Estonian troops also served with the REF , mostly in the 1st and 3rd Brigades . After February 1917 these troops wore small Estonian flags to distinguish themselves from their Russian allies . On the 23rd of April the 1st Special Brigade was transferred to Châlons - sur - Marne and overseen by General Henri Gouraud of the 4th Army . The French President was impressed by the camp and awarded General Lokhvitsky with the " Commander of the Legion of Honor " medal . The 1st Brigade was then sent to the East between Suippes and Auberive at the end of June , 1916 . By March 1917 the Special Brigades were in the Fort Pompelle region , and on April 16 , 1917 the 1st Brigade took Courcy and the 3rd brigade took Mount Spin , resulting in 4 , 542 men killed , wounded or missing in action . The Cimitière Militaire Russe de Saint - Hilaire le Grand at Mourmelon - le - Grand in the Marne Department contains the graves of 1000 Russian officers and men . In 1937 a chapel was built here to commemorate all of the Russians who died on the Western Front . There are also two Imperial Russian war graves in the Gouzeaucourt New British Cemetery , near Cambrai . Mutiny . After the Russian October Revolution and subsequent withdrawal of Russia from the Allied countries the Russian troops were looked upon with distrust and relegated to labor companies and internment camps , primarily at Camp Militaire , near La Courtine . The camp was divided into the 1st and 2nd Brigades . The Russian soldiers in one of the camps began questioning why they were fighting for the French at all and mutinied . The other camp was still led by Russian officers ( notably Colonel Gotua ) and was used to help suppress the rebellious one . Finally the French , backed by a newly arrived Russian manned 75mm field artillery regiment , shelled the rebellious camp , resulting in approximately 10 dead and 44 wounded , as well as an unknown number of dead and wounded shot by Gotua ' s camp . The survivors were at first sent to jail camps in North Africa and France , and after some months many were sent back to Russia , while a good number of the men integrated into French society . Russian Legion . The loyal men under Colonel Gotua demanded that they be allowed to fight and thus was formed the Russian Legion . It joined the French 1st Moroccan Infantry Division on December 13 , 1917 . The combined units then took place in the fighting around Amiens in March 1918 , with severe losses to the Moroccan Division and the Russian Legion . Captain Loupanoff of the Russian Legion was decorated with the Medal of the Legion of Honor by the commander of the Moroccan Division , General Douzan . In May 1918 the Moroccan Division took part in the fierce fighting on the road from Soissons to Paris . The Russian Legion was sent in by Colonel Lagarde as badly needed reinforcements for the Moroccan Division . Losses during the fighting accounted for nearly 85 % of the Russian Legion ' s forces . In July the Legion was sent reinforcements made primarily of volunteers from old regiments of the Expeditionary Corps and was reformed into the 1st Brigade of the Moroccan Division . More reinforcements arrived in August to bring the total to 2 infantry companies as well as a mortar unit which turned the Brigade into a Regiment . The Regiment was then sent towards Laffaux . Marshal Ferdinand Foch , Commander of the French Army , awarded the Russian Regiment with a special flag after their actions on September 12 , where the Regiment managed to pierce the German defences , making its way through 3 lines of fortifications and capturing prisoners and materials , despite taking heavy losses . This attracted more volunteers , so that by November 1 , 1918 the Regiment had 564 men . The battalion in turn was divided into a machine gun company and 3 infantry companies . After the German withdrawal to the border the Moroccan Division , including the Russian Regiment , advanced upon Moyeuvre . The operation was halted by the signing of the armistice treaty on November 11 . Near the end of 1918 the entire Russian Regiment was recalled and demobilized . Some Russians chose to remain in France , while others returned to revolutionary Russia . Among the latter was Rodion Malinovsky , the future Soviet Minister of Defence .