At this point i need to know what size should be in there or if i should give up and spring for a new Tange Levin provided the french frames were not some sort of proprietary size that i have to use some kind of french headset.
....they were, mostly. Don't know about yours exactly. The tubing diameters were all metric, so the sizes for clamps and headsets are different, and the threading on the fork is different too. Velo Orange was selling a French headset for a while. You can check on their website. Otherwise, French stuff shows up on the French version of E-bay, and Amazon.
When a bike like that gets old enough, It can be difficult to figure out the mechanical history. Someone before you might have swapped out one of the races, etc.
Measure the crown race seat on the fork before you buy anything. Some of these had a larger crown race seat diameter as well (27.2 or something equally unexpected.)