Hot Ground under the Soldiers’ Feet

The last stage of the training for the battalion comprised the peacekeepers’ individual and collective target practices on the shooting range of the ‘Vay Ádám’ Training Base in Hajdúhadház. During the first individual phase the soldiers fired non-lethal shots on silhouette targets. The second phase was a force-level training which involved an attack on a vehicle checkpoint (VCP), and daytime and nighttime live fire exercises during convoy escort tasks.

While in the area of operations, crowd and riot control (CRC) is among the key missions of the KFOR contingent. The unruly crowd of protesters behaves unpredictably, so they may attack the peacekeepers with practically any kind of improvised weapons (cobblestones, bricks, iron rods, Molotov cocktails). During the training program the soldiers have acquired the different CRC techniques to respond to these attacks. The “fire phobia" practice (counter-Molotov-cocktail action) run by the mentors assisting the training (the nominated personnel of the KFOR-4 HUNCON) formed an active part of the preparation, which provided the peacekeepers with an opportunity to learn what it will be like to literally have a “hot ground" under their feet, and what they should do in such cases.