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April 2001 - Victor Babiuc, at that time the Defense Minister of Romania, signed an order which passed the Special Operations subunit from the control of the 30th Guard and Protocol Brigade "Mihai Viteazul" to the Directive of Military Protection and Security (formerly called Directive of Army Intelligence). This elite special forces unit is designated for assuring the protection of military VIP's and for surgical anti-terrorist strikes. Romania had at that time two Directives which had a more or less similar mission and assignment: The Military Protection and Security Directive, under the command of Division-General dr. Eugen Badalan, and the Scouting Directive of the General Chief of Staff, under the command of Brigadier-General Nicu Apostu. Some of the fighters of the DPDM are ex- high performance sports masters. Remarcably, DPDM also has women among its combatant members. DPDM fighters have weekly live fire trainings (which involve live ammunition) with several weapons cathegories, ranging from the common automatic weapons to the Jericho handgun and the much feared Uzzi. The fighters spend several hours a day, every day, in the gym to ensure and maintain a high level of physical strength, as well as perform lengthy jogging sessions, as well as martial arts practicing. The members of this unit also undertake mountain warfare training sessions in order to maintain a mountain intervention capability for anti-terrorist purposes. Known as "the men of the shadows", the members of DPDM ensure the protection of Romanian military VIP's, as well as visiting foreign military officials on their stay in Romania. This mission is very similar to the one of SPP's FIAT. DPDM is a "Defense Ministry's FIAT", smaller, but equally capable. In fact, several members of FIAT were ex-DPDM members, which transfered from the military to the SPP (equivalent of the US Secret Service), where they perform the same missions, but get a much, much higher pay-check. As some of the former members of this elite unit went to SPP, others have left to become members of SRI's Anti-Terrorism Brigade, the country's leading CT structure. But perhaps the best men that the Defense Ministry and the Romanian Armed Forces in general lost, are the former DPDM fighters who quit, and left abroad to become personal bodyguards of characters such as Silvester Stalone and Madonna. Thanks to Doru Dragomir for some of the information in this article |
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