Detaşamentul de Intervenţie Rapidă

Detașamentul Special de Protecție și Intervenție
DSPI soldiers during an exercise
Active	1990-Present
Country	Romania
Branch	Special Operations Command
Type	Special Forces
Role	Counter-terrorism, Reconnaissance, Explosives, VIP Protection
Size	About 145
Nickname(s)	DSPI/DIR
Commanders
Current commander	Classified

Detașamentul Special de Protecție și Intervenție (Ex. Detașamentul de Intervenție Rapidă, DIR) (DSPI, The Special Detachment of Protection and Intervention) of the Romanian Ministry of Defense is an elite special operations unit of the Romanian military. It should not be confused with the Detașamentul de Poliție pentru Intervenție Rapidă (DPIR/SPIR/DIR, Police Rapid Intervention Detachment) of the Police Force. They are different units, with radically different capabilities and reporting structure.

During the early 1990s, a very small special operations (SOF) detachment was born within the Romanian military. It was incorporated in what was at that time the 30th Guard Brigade, or Brigada 30 Gardă "Mihai Viteazul".

Referred to simply as "the special operations subunit", this small detachment was relatively unknown, even among armed forces personnel. In a few years, the unit was renamed Detașamentul pentru Protecția Demnitarilor Militari (DPDM, "Detachment for the Protection of Military Dignitaries"). DPDM continued to be part of the 30th Guard Brigade. In 1998, the same year when the top-secret Grupul Antiterorist of the Foreign Intelligence Service (SIE) was born, the DPDM was given its current name, Detașamentul de Intervenție Rapidă, and starting with 2009 was renamed into "Detașamentul Special de Protecție și Intervenție".

In 2000, DSPI was moved again, from the 30th Guard Brigade to the Military Police. This was followed 5 years later by the reduction of the 30th Guard Brigade and its transformation into a regiment. The number of DSPI operatives continued to grow, and the detachment reached company-size soon (145 members in 2003).

In December 2003, the military, which had kept the detachment secret for six years, unveiled it in a public show on television. DSPI was presented as being a small detachment of carefully selected operatives used mainly to protect military VIPs in Romania, as well as foreign VIPs visiting the country. However, when interviewed by a reporter, a DSPI operative stated that he had participated in several operations abroad, along with similar units from other NATO countries. Captain Arthur Elisei also suggested that DSPI has been partially modeled after the British SAS; the detachment has also trained with the Israeli Sayeret Mat'kal and Italy's GIS (Gruppo di Intervento Speciale).