Don't think French Air force ever had any clipped wing Spits, especially at that time.
In November 1942, after the allies landings in North Africa and the invasion of southern France by German troops, this was the end of the Vichy gouvernement that was collaborating with the Germans. As a consequence, Vichy army in North Africa joined Allies forces. French forces will have to face a very difficult thing for the months to come: joining ex-Vichy units and Free French units in the same Army.
Some French Air Force units were engaged in the Tunisian campaign but this experience highlighted that they sufferd a lack of training because they were not allow to fly enough when under Vichy control. Moreover, they didn't know much about Allies tactics and their English was not good. For this campaign, bombers squadrons used their old LeO451 for night ops, GC 2/5 Lafayette was quickly equipped with P40 and the GC 2/7 arrived at the end of the campaign with it's Spit V trop.
After this, Allies decided that all French units will have to train before being engaged over France or Italy. Training consisted of shipping convoys protection from Algeria. They were equipped with P39 and Spit V trop for these missions. Until 1944, French Air Force only recieved worn second hand aircrafts and Pierre le Gloan died after an engine failure occured on his P39 during a shipping convoy protection. After this terrible loss, brand new engines were recieved by the unit to replace the worn ones.
Once engaged, none of the squadrons will be used for air supperiority missions, they will all be used for air to ground missions. French Air Force was not engaged in 1943, first units started operations from Corsica early 1944. GC 1/3 Corse recieved brand new Spitfire V early january 1944 and then, they provided escort for USAAF B25 over Italy from Corsica. First P47 Razorback arrived in april/may 1944 and were engaged from Corsica.
... but there is an exception in 1943, the invasion of Corsica!
After Italy's armistice on 8th Septembre 1943, resistance forces in Corsica decided to launch a major offensive, they managed to capture Ajaccio on 9th september. They asked for help from French Army. Corsica was not in Allies plans, they were focused on Anzio and Salerne. Morover, they juged an action there too risky because of the presence of German troops, they didn't want to divert their own forces. They accepted the French army to be engage but they will not recieve any help. Admiral Cunningham gave ships for the landings.
Bastia was taken by the Germans in the afternoon of 11th september so the landings will be at Ajaccio, it's operation 'Vesuve'.
After the landings, as situation on the island was still very confuse, spitfire V trop from GC I/3 and II/7 were send to support the invasion. They will operate from Campo dell'Oro. At the beginning, it was just a few aircrafts for one day but, from the 27th September, both squadrons were definitely operational in corsica, Allies accepted to divert them from their shipping escort duties. On 23th Septembre, an American LST brought a mobile radar to Corsica.
German tropps have started to retreat from Corsica, they were using Bastia shipyards under Luftwaffe cover, especially FW190F of II./Sch.G.2.
Spits flown strafing missions on Bastia where they suffered losses due to heavy flack and air superiority duties. Operations in Corsica ended on 4th October, both squadrons shot down several aircrafts from many different types: Ju88, FW190, Arado 196, Ju52, Me323 and Do217 armed with HS293 missiles.
After this, they came back to shipping protection duties from Algeria.
After operation Dragoon, all French units followed tropps advance up to Germany, none of them stayed in the MTO except one if I remember well that continued to operate over Italy with it's P39 from southern France.
As they were used for air to ground missions, they didn't scored many victories because ennemy aircrafts were rarely seen, most dangerous ennemy was flack. They encountered ANR only two times: once, it was B26 that were escorted by RAF Spitfire and the other time, it was 10 P47 Razorback that have been intercepted by ANR 109s while dropping their bombs on a bridge.
Situation for bombers squadrons was quite similar. They were all equipped by B26 except GB 2/23 Guyenne and GB 1/25 Tunisie that were send to England from where they flown night bombing ops with Hallifaxes under Bomber Command control.
