Sandra Budimir

Sandra Budimir

Christina Mackenzie
Innovation accelerator

Sandra’s unusual childhood holidays in the midst of the Balkan wars in Croatia left her with a distinct leaning towards the military. “When I was little I wanted to be a soldier and with hindsight I wish I’d gone to St Cyr [France’s army officer training instituion],” she says. Co-founder of Starburst Accelerator, the world’s leading … entirely dedicated to start-ups in the defence and aerospace sectors and mother of a little girl, she regrets that “my schedule leaves me no time to be in the reserve force….”

Sergeant Mélanie

Sergeant Mélanie

Christina Mackenzie
Air Force

Mélanie fires missiles. Somewhat infrequently. That’s because since 2002, when she joined the French Air Force, there have been no enemy air threats against any French military operations. I met her on the disused air force base of Brétigny, just south of Paris, where she’d been rehearsing for the Bastille Day (14th July) parade with her surface-to-air defence squadron (EDSA), whose mission is to protect military installations and points of vital importance, and to support the ground forces. The squadron has also recently been given the responsibility for countering malicious airborne drones…

Sergeant Anne-Laure

Sergeant Anne-Laure

Christina Mackenzie
Army

Anne-Laure thinks ahead and is well-organised. Enlisted in the French Army since 2015, she has just recently signed a second six-year contract, a year longer than her first one. Until earlier this year she was the only female gun-turret operator in the 1st Hunter Regiment. But, at the end of 2020, knowing full well that squeezing around the interior of a Leclerc tank is not practicable for a pregnant woman, she requested a job more suited to a personal situation she was planning for 2021. And it’s a good thing she did because she and her partner’s plans to start a family are coming to fruition. Baby Jules should make his appearance in early November…

Sergeant Titaua

Sergeant Titaua

Christina Mackenzie
Army

Titaua (pronounce Titawa with emphasis on the first syllable) left her native island of Taha’a (between Tahiti and Bora-Bora in French Polynesia) at 19, swapping her sarong for army fatigues. Ten years later she was an NRBC mechanic (nuclear, radiological, biological and chemical) in the 1st hunter regiment (1er régiment de chasseurs). “I wasn't too interested in studying and wanted to do something instead of spending my days hanging around outdoors. On top of which I didn’t want to stay in Polynesia and wanted to be closer to my sister, who’d been adopted in France,” she says. Some of her acquaintances, who were in the reserves, “encouraged me, helped me with the application formalities and prepared me, especially for the physical part by making me run and do suspensions,” she laughs…

Regimental Sergeant-Major Julie

Regimental Sergeant-Major Julie

Christina Mackenzie
Army

Julie, a meteorologist in the 3rd combat helicopter regiment laughs when I ask her why she didn’t join either the air force or the navy. “The army was an obvious choice for me because my grandfather and my father were both career soldiers,” she explains. But she knew nothing about meteorology and it was the armed forces recruitment centre (CIRFA) in Strasbourg “that first introduced me to the idea of becoming a meteorologist”, the young Alsatian recounts. She followed up on their suggestion to spend a week in meteorological immersion to discover what the job was about and she was hooked…

Lieutenant Lucie

Lieutenant Lucie

Christina Mackenzie
Army

Lucie is the only platoon commander in the 1st Hunter Regiment (régiment de chasseurs) in Thierville-sur-Meuse near Verdun in north-east France. The tool she works with weighs some 55 tonnes, is 3m60 wide and 3m06 high. Despite this imposing size, the working space inside the Leclerc battle tank, because this is the tool in question, is extremely tight. Having had the good fortune to ride in a Leclerc a few years ago, I speak from experience…

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