Earlier this week, five commandos from the country trained personnel from the city's Special Protection Unit on how to respond quickly to conflict situations
While every country’s strategic security situation and the methods to uphold it are unique, a little help is never unwelcome. MiD DAY has learnt that on Monday and Tuesday, Special Protection Unit (SPU) of Mumbai Police exchanged ideas with some Israeli commandos who were in the city. Cops said this exercise would help them improve their work efficiency and reduce response time while dealing with any untoward incidents.
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The elite SPU that guards several VIPs and VVIPs had a brainstorming session with their Israeli friends at the Goregaon SRPF grounds. “The Israelis are well trained and are more experienced in dealing with guerrilla attacks, because since its foundation their nation has been at war with its neighbours. The commandos of Israel are considered the best in reacting to a conflict situation and coming out of it alive,” said a police officer from Protection branch.
“Their men are adept at handling guns, pistols and rifles and they can fire within seconds if somebody attacks them. While we are less experienced in dealing with such situations as very few VIPs have been attacked in this country, in Israel these episodes are frequent. So, as a preparatory measure the higher-ups in Mumbai Police Protection branch arranged for an interaction with them for our police force. While they can load a bullet in a magazine and be ready to shoot in around 3 to 4 seconds, it normally takes us about 10 seconds to accomplish the same,” said another police officer.
Around 30 SPU police officers were imparted training by five Israeli commandos. “It was a very fruitful exercise and exchange of ideas will help us both,” said Madhukar Pandey, additional commissioner of police (protection and security).
Sources say police officers like Hemant Karkare, encounter specialist Vijay Salaskar and Ashok Kamte were carrying the best weapons, but were still killed in the 26/11 attacks, as they had no training in terms of responding to such a situation in quick time.