RPI stands for Récupération de personnel isolé, the French term for recovering isolated personnel. The French framework combines military, diplomatic and civilian measures to recover people from a hostile environment and subsequently reintegrate them. Command organisations, recovery forces and the isolated person work together. The national interpretation focuses on personnel who are separated from their unit or organisation, have not been captured and need to be recovered.
The French national framework
Military isolation occurs when, after separation, the person's organisation can no longer exercise control directly or through agreed procedures. This can happen after an aircraft accident, during a land mission or in a maritime operation. Civilian personnel attached to an operation can also be affected. The French RPI framework addresses operations outside France in a hostile environment: an adversary has both the capability and the intent to impede friendly forces. For the person, a conspicuous signal or exposed movement can therefore create a capture risk alongside the environmental danger.
SERE prepares personnel to survive, avoid capture, resist exploitation and return. This preparation also covers captivity. The French RPI boundary treats hostage release as a separate specialist operation. The recovery organisation continues to follow a captured person's situation so that it can prepare a recovery after escape.
Search and rescue without an adversary threat, maritime rescue and evacuation of nationals have different remits. Immediate recovery by forces already at the scene also falls outside this RPI framework if contact with the unit continues and isolation has not occurred. A rescue task for deployed forces in an unthreatened area can nevertheless use the existing PR organisation when there is no local rescue capability.
Preparation and individual action
Preparation must connect personal SERE skills with the recovery procedures of the operating area. These include the intended contact routes, position information, signals and conduct during pickup. Before the mission, an Evasion Plan of Action describes intended actions and movements following isolation; it gives recovery forces indications of where to search. An ISOPREP contains prepared information for identification and authentication. The two serve different purposes: the movement plan helps the search, while authentication information helps verify identity.
After separation, the person must assess the immediate threat, their physical condition and the means they still have. In the French aircrew context, this includes checking the surroundings after landing, sorting retained survival equipment and attempting initial contact if a usable communication device is available. At the same time, the adversary may be searching the probable landing area. Protection, sustaining oneself and avoiding capture therefore begin while contact is still being prepared.
The person's movement decision must bring together injuries, terrain, opportunities for protection and planned recovery. Leaving a likely search location because of an immediate threat may improve protection, but it also changes the basis of the search. Continuing without a reachable destination consumes strength and water and may cause the person to lose track of their position. They must therefore consider what movement they can actually manage, which equipment they need to retain and how to establish or later report the new location.
Reporting, locating and authenticating
The initial report of isolation may come from the person, another unit or an observer. Failure to carry out an expected action may also raise the alarm. Recovery can therefore be prepared even when the person has been unable to request help. The organisation checks the report because an error or adversary deception can also draw forces to the wrong location.
A personal radio, telephone or data device helps only if it has been retained, is working and can establish a usable connection. Determining one's own GPS position does not transmit it. If contact becomes possible, the recipient needs usable location information and a report of the person's physical condition. Threats at the location, limited ability to walk or movement that has already taken place affect whether forces can reach and recover the person. Information about a former location must remain identifiable as such, so that it does not keep the search fixed on the wrong point.
Position signals serve a different function from a two-way conversation. A light, mirror or smoke signal can help the final part of the search if it can actually be detected and associated with the person. Infrared signals require suitable observation equipment; terrain and visibility can prevent detection. Visible markings can also attract the adversary's attention. Their use therefore follows the threat and the prepared contact procedures. A signal is particularly useful when friendly forces are already within range and know which sign to expect.
Even precise coordinates do not replace authentication. Recovery forces must verify that they are in contact with the intended person before exposing themselves to a possible trap or ambush. The person cooperates through the prepared procedure and the identification information intended for it. Broadcasting confidential information indiscriminately over an open channel would weaken the protection provided by that check. Procedures must be known before deployment and must work with the equipment actually being used.
Appui and soutien: two support functions
Appui prepares extraction in the French RPI framework: reconnaissance can clarify the situation at the location, while other forces can engage adversary threats to the approach or pickup. Soutien provides physical and psychological assistance to the isolated person, for example through two-way communication or resupply. The relevant forces, routes and means must actually be available.
Through an established connection, the person can report an injury, inability to move, limited supplies or a threat to the intended pickup location. This information helps forces prepare the assistance needed for pickup, possible resupply and protection of the approach. In particular, they need to know whether the person can reach the pickup location independently or must be reached where they are.
Forces and French recovery methods
Where possible, the person's unit first uses its available forces. If these are insufficient, the component's Personnel Recovery Coordination Cell, the PRCC, coordinates additional assets. The Joint Personnel Recovery Centre, the JPRC, can bring together contributions from other components. The recovery force is assembled for the specific task. It may consist of a vehicle and a pickup team, or combine several air and ground assets with reconnaissance, protection and medical support. Its tasks include final location and authentication, protection against adversary threats and the recovery itself. Threat, distance, access, available forces and other ongoing missions determine which solution is feasible.
In the French récupération au combat, Combat Recovery, conventional tactical skills enable recovery when the other methods are not used. RESCo, recherche et sauvetage de combat, requires appropriately prepared and equipped personnel as well as qualified recovery forces. In the French interpretation, the need for local air superiority and a complex, integrated air operation are also distinguishing features. For the isolated person, this means that agreed communication, signalling and authentication must function with the intended force package.
In the French framework, UAR describes recovery conducted by special forces. Assets from other components can be integrated or support those forces. Nationally, NAR describes recovery means outside the armed forces. Diplomatic measures and civilian authorities, organisations or individuals can prepare, support or conduct recovery. Nonmilitary options are selected at the strategic level on the recommendation of the COMANFOR, the deployed joint force commander. These actors are not at the commander's disposal in the same way as assigned military forces. Military command coordinates its activities with the nonmilitary measures and can support them. For the person on the ground, a chance encounter is therefore not yet a confirmed recovery route; establishing who a contact belongs to and following the intended pickup procedure remain essential.
Recovery and reintegration
Recovery places the person under the physical control of friendly forces, or of France or a partner state. It involves final contact, identity verification and bringing the person together with the pickup team. The person uses the prepared signals and follows instructions adapted to the actual situation. Where communication is possible, an injury or inability to move needs to be known before pickup: it changes access to the location and the transport or medical support required.
Reintegration begins with transfer to the person's unit or a designated organisation. It combines restoration of physical and psychological condition with the collection of time-sensitive information about isolation, SERE and recovery. The person can describe injuries, exposure and strain, possible captivity, observations of the adversary and the sequence of contacts. This helps both their care and the adjustment of further recovery measures. Medical and psychological assessments and any necessary evacuation follow the recovered person's actual condition.