Argentine Cav Unit Marks 200th Anniversary
In news from south of the border, the Regimiento de Caballería de Tanques 1 (“Coronel Brandsen”) is marking its 200th anniversary this year.
RC Tan 1, today part of the 1.ª División’s II Brigada Blindada, was originally established on the 1st of February 1826, just as the Regimiento 1 de Caballería, and celebrates its regimental day every March 1st.
Formed as a hussar unit, its first regimental commander was a Paris-born Dutchman, Charles Louis Frédéric de Brandtzen, who is remembered as Carlos Luis Federico de Brandsen in Argentina.
Before emigrating to South America to fight the Spanish, Brandtzen/Brandsen served in Napoleon’s ministry of war, then picked up a junior officer’s commission in the Italian cavalry, served in Russia in 1812, and the German campaign in 1813, moved to a French regiment with a captain’s commission, and served through Waterloo, earning a Legion of Honor.
“The Grande Armée Crossing the Berezina,” by Polish artist and army officer January Suchodolski (1866). Of the 50,000 members of the Army of the Kingdom of Italy that marched as part of Napoleon’s Grande Armee into Russia in 1812, just 2,500, Brandtzen included, survived the campaign.
Losing his France privileges as a Bonapartist, he served in the Argentine Regimiento de Granaderos in the Chile campaign in 1817-19, then was commander of the Peruvian Legion of the Hussars of the Guard, eventually promoted to brigadier general in the Peruvian military.
He was a captain on the field at Nazca, Peru, on 15 October 1820, when a force of 250 Peruvian mounted grenadiers under Lt. Col. Manuel Rojas bested 700 fine Spanish cavalry under the command of the Marquis de Quimper.
Federico de Brandsen painted by Jean-Philippe Goulu
Brandtzen/Brandsen arrived back in Argentina just in time for the country’s war with Brazil and led the newly formed Regimiento 1 de Caballería, which now carries his name, and was killed in action at Ituzaingó in February 1827, dead at 41, and is remembered throughout Argentina as a hero.
Converted from horses to tanks only in 1968 (!) when they hung up their chargers for surplus M4 Shermans.
The Argentines used so-called “Repotenciado” (repowered) model Shermans, converted from British Firefly IC variants, as late as the mid-1980s. These carried a L/44 FTR 105 gun and a Ford V8.
Today RC Tan 1 operates the Tanque Argentino Mediano (TAM), a domestic 30-ton main battle tank (made with German help) that uses a 105mm gun and has been in service since the 1980s, and the 20mm Rh-202-armed TAM VCTP infantry fighting vehicle.
The regiment has five campaign streamers, including the cordón de Ituzaingó, earned with Colonel Brandsen at its head.