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what was vincent jean reno doing before working as a mercenary?


what was vincent jean reno doing before working as a mercenary?was he a military?a killer?a guy working for the mob?a secret agent?

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I got the impression that he was also undercover, perhaps for a French Intelligence agency?



"Leave the gun, take the cannoli."

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Either undercover, or like the other characters, former secret service or something along those lines.....

Given he repeated what Di Nero said earlier when talking to the USA Secret service guy about "being a friend", I always felt that was a hint that he was also undercover

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I got the impression that Vincent was just a regular criminal with no special training background. He obviously had connections, but he had no knowledge of military terms, how to extract a bullet, he was humble, etc. In other words, he had no real knowledge of things that would most likely be taught in Special Forces 101, like Sam. At the end "No questions, no answers, we just take the job and move on". To me he was just a guy looking for money by doing whatever he has to get done no matter how dirty. He was the only one that seemed concerned and actually asked if the job would involve shooting. No one else had even asked, meaning they could care less as if they were already used to combat. Almost as is if he's saying "I hope it doesn't involve shooting cause I don't want to get killed" where as the others had that "if it involves shooting, I'm gonna kill some people" attitude. Plus when he met those guys at the arena and the guy asks him "where do I know you from?" "Vienna" Vincent replies, meaning they possibly had done a job together before as mercenaries. That's why the guy semi apologizes for having to kill him on this job...



"Remember my username...you'll be screaming it later"

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Not sure how you got that in the "Vienna" bit--The city was a hotbed of cold war intrigue with all the major NATO and Warsaw Pact Secret/Intel Services being involved. The 'Where do I know you from' Guy stuck me as an Eastern European like Gregor, so the comment reminded me of cold war monkey business....

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Yeah he sounded eastern to me too. Most likely and from what I remember, I haven't seen it in some time, German. And yeah, Vienna was a hot spot, but that doesn't have to make Vincent an ex secret agent of some sort. There was a lot of monkey business going around, that's for sure. Both official and non official. Vincent struck me as one of those probably under the table ones doing mercenary jobs for higher intel...



"Remember my username...you'll be screaming it later"

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"he had no knowledge of military terms"

I'd say he had no knowledge of American military terms. The French always try to stick to their own language, even in NATO and other international matters.

One example for that is the French paratroopers special forces unit GCP. From 1981 till 2000 it was called "Commandos de recherche et d'action en profondeur", with the abbreviation "CRAP". They just didn't care what any English speaker would think of that!

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Yeah but as Irish rogue operatives who had employed mercenaries from several countries, the terms they were using seemed to be universal ones he seemed to have a vague knowledge of. He even said it himself "ah yes, a military term" when she used the word "disband" and he asked what it meant. A word that common civilians didn't seem to use. Hell, even Spence, the wanna be ex military operative knew it...



"Remember my username...you'll be screaming it later"

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Obviously, he was a spook like Sam. That's the whole idea of the concept of the Ronin. They are supposed to be honorable men who suffered the shame of treachery, became thieves, and hired hands until they exact their vengeance. How else would Vincent know the secluded samurai model maker and ask him for information about two Irish operatives in Paris? The old retired man was from the French intelligence service and so was Vincent. That's how Vincent got the information about the whereabouts of Seamus and Deidre.

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