16/06/2025
Burnout is impossible with us; you’re always engaged in a different way. But you have to have a warrior’s mindset, says Martin Svozil
Petr Duchoslav
November 28, 2021, 13:00
photo: Martin Svozil
SM presents an interview with former member of the elite URNA unit, Martin Svozil. What requirements must one meet to become part of this unit, how important is the mental mindset, and what is Svozil doing today? You will learn all of this in our conversation.
Q: A few months ago in Teplice, there was an incident in which a 46-year-old drug addict died. How do you assess the officers’ intervention—could they actually have caused his death, or was it handled entirely professionally?
A: I’ll begin with complete honesty. Those who were directly involved in such incidents should speak about them first and foremost. I hardly watch these events at all. The death of a human being is always a tremendous tragedy. During an operation, it becomes even more challenging because you’re enforcing the law and ensuring the safety of everyone involved. It affects not only the offender but his family—and certainly also the officers on the scene. The bodies investigating the incident have days to evaluate decisions you must make in split seconds on site. In URNA we have a significant advantage: we train every step meticulously, but street officers usually don’t have time to prepare for the majority of their work.
For example, consider the case of escorting a man without a face mask in České Budějovice. You need to see two levels: every citizen is obliged to prove their identity, and no one should place any obstacles in that. On the other hand, when officers have the numbers, I’d expect them to persuade the man tactically rather than resort to unnecessary aggression. Unlike loud-mouthed politicians, a police officer bears responsibility for his actions and will have to account for them. It would be great if journalists didn’t so often pander to the tabloids. Let me remind anyone interested that a policeman never knows in the morning whether he will return home that evening. They deal with tasks of this kind much more frequently than other armed services. They want to protect everyone—even, it may seem, the aggressive individual.
Q: What is your opinion on the pronounced wave of reactions from Roma organizations and foreign media, for whom Teplice has become a clear example that the Czech Republic has its own George Floyd?
A: Look, recently in Belgium they stabbed a Slovak, and you don’t see people writing that Belgians have their own Floyd. In my view, it’s a tendentious affair. Here, minorities are often set against the majority simply to create catchy headlines—but racism, as it’s presented here and purportedly rooted in society, doesn’t exist. I don’t think it’s racist to say that with rights come duties. Yet when I read articles—or even just headlines—I sometimes get the feeling the goal is to help everyone with their rights, while duties are tactfully kept silent, which can irritate certain groups. Each incident then becomes water for the tabloids’ mill.
I’ll add from my time in the SPJ (Special Order Unit): it’s not about minorities per se, but about the approach of some media. We once escorted a group of football fans at Prague’s main station after a match. The atmosphere was tense, and an incident was expected at any moment. Yet my colleagues communicated with the fans so professionally that the crowd decided to vent their frustration with song and calmly boarded the train. At that moment, a TV crew from a fairly large outlet walked by—I heard the host say, “There’s nothing to film here; they calmed them down.”
For me, that says it all about how the media want to report. It’s true that in many parts of the world people of another skin color have had their rights suppressed for generations, but why drag us into that? We were never slave traders, never took part in colonization or forced relocations. That’s why, as a nation, we’re ready to responsibly respect every individual’s rights regardless of their skin color.
Q: Lumír Němec, a former policeman and war veteran, says that the prestige of the police in citizens’ eyes has been declining for a long time and that today people dare to do to them what, for example, before 1989 would have been unthinkable. Do you agree that officers are still viewed through the lens of the past—as a force that represses rather than helps?
A: It might be good to recall that the respect many officers enjoyed before 1989 was based on completely different foundations. Today, many say, “That was so long ago—why keep talking about it?” Young people don’t know what that was about. How much a past affiliation with the party or repressive forces matters is evident in how people react to cooperation or non-cooperation of our highest politician with the former regime. The new reputation of the police will not be linked to the pre-November (1989) scene. Rather, there’s a subtle tendency to gradually discredit the police as an institution.
Their cars still bear the motto “Pomáhat a chránit” (“To Help and Protect”), yet they must stop vehicles without any apparent reason. It makes me think they might as well rewrite it to “Zdržovat a otravovat” (“To Delay and Annoy”). In some high-profile cases, you see that effort alone isn’t enough. The elite units gather everything they can, but lawyers looking for loopholes tear their work apart bit by bit—and no one talks about that anymore. I’ve never tried the work of elite detectives, but it must be very taxing to see where your long-term work ends up—like in the Nečasová case. Wiretaps clearly show she committed or was involved in illegal acts, but those tapes get thrown out with a single decision, and people receive a notice like, “If you have good lawyers, you can do whatever you want.”
If we apply simple logic: who makes laws? Politicians. And who drafts those laws for politicians? Aren’t they the same legal agencies that then exploit those very laws against us honest people? When you reflect on it, politicians don’t create mistakes in the laws—they just read them and say, “I think, broadly speaking, this is correct.” Yet they have experts on retainer to draft them. And no one holds those experts accountable when a “mistake” appears in some regulation. That’s why I see a connection—and perhaps even some backdoors, like programmers put into software: “this might come in handy some day, let’s see if it passes.” I think politicians like that loophole-ridden legislation, which many take advantage of, thereby devaluing the police’s work.
Q: You were a long-time member of URNA. What prerequisites must one meet to be accepted into this unit?
A: Many people think it’s all about physical fitness. On the first day of the selection, I thought my chances were zero. I saw many guys outperform me significantly in some disciplines—I was more or less average across the board. Then the head instructor for physical training came up to me and said, “Relax—we need to see what you’re capable of, and we don’t need extremes.” In the end, my average performance was more advantageous than someone running faster or doing more pull-ups. To be clear, “average” still meant a lot of push-ups, sit-ups, pull-ups, and overall endurance. And once you start, you understand why. You need to know when to use coercive measures, what to say into the radio, and you need to have “it” more in your head than in your body—using your body only to accomplish the toughest tasks.
I remember vividly chasing a suspect through a village, across fields, into a grove between fields. I sprinted endlessly weighted down with over thirty kilos of equipment—and we caught him. Now, several years after leaving the unit, I can’t imagine such a long sprint even without the load. So what must one have? You must above all have the desire. You must be prepared to sacrifice a lot, work very hard, and never stray from your dream.
Q: URNA’s chief instructor Jiří Laňka once said in an interview that for this unit mental strength is even more important than physical, because work in URNA is an extreme psychological burden. Did you ever hit the limits of your own psychological endurance?
A: Jiří Laňka and I talked about this many times—even in Baghdad—and once he told me a phrase that has stayed with me my whole life: “We consider normal things that would drive other people insane.” You must understand that the psych exams—and the psychologist—also evaluate whether you can endure it. That’s why with us there aren’t people who “snap” and end up in a mental institution. It’s not easier than it seems; it really is sometimes hard.
I remember one very emotional story: during a medic course, I was present for the resuscitation of an 18-year-old girl. At first it was thought she had overdosed, but the autopsy revealed a different cause. That’s not really the point, because we were unsuccessful in the resuscitation. The first difficulty was, of course, the girl herself. Her mother sat next to the doctor—we were in a small enclosed space, I think it was a restroom. When our supplies ran out, we needed more from the vehicle—but we discovered a crowd outside wanting to lynch the medics. So I was the one who went out to get new supplies, pushing through the crowd, and I was almost certain someone would complain about me afterward. I used my elbows almost as if in a fight. On the way back, my mind raced: they won’t stop celebrating…people are aggressive, drunk… I must get back in time… I must protect the whole team… I hope the girl makes it… After 45 minutes, the decision was made that she had died. For weeks afterward I couldn’t sleep over that experience.
Another extremely trying moment happened abroad. It’s very emotional to hear over the radio that your friends’ vehicle has been hit. You know they’re handling the situation and can’t respond to you, but you desperately want to know they’re okay, to be with them, to help them, or even trade places with them. And you know they’ll manage—that’s the most important thing. It was never that I didn’t know what to do, but sometimes it was right on the edge, when you wonder how much more can we endure?
Q: You also served on foreign missions, for example in Afghanistan. What was the nature of your work?
A: I only visited Afghanistan briefly. My longest missions were in Iraq and Pakistan. In any case, the task is to protect Czech Republic citizens so they can safely carry out their important duties for our country and return. Members and staff of an embassy have a diplomatic mission to fulfill. The Czech Republic deploys a rapid-deployment unit with national jurisdiction, and unlike the army, we can operate on Czech soil. The fact that the army took over in Afghanistan was a political decision, and certain agreements had to be made to enable the embassy’s transfer.
Q: What ultimately prompted you to leave URNA? Did the unit still have something to give you, or did you experience burnout after 15 years?
A: The term “burnout” covers a wide range of experiences. Everyone in their job goes through feelings now described as burnout—and it’s truly terrible. I was lucky not to experience it, but I saw it. It’s not worth it. In most jobs it’s related to feeling that management isn’t doing things well, that you know how to do it better, and you want to be heard. With elite units, you want to be the best, unbeatable. You know the opponents’ capabilities and want to prepare for them as well as possible. Sometimes things don’t move as fast as you’d like, and you feel frustrated. Occasionally you can’t see the forest for the trees. Then it’s up to leadership to help their people see decision-making processes in a different light.
You really can’t burn out at URNA. Training is always evolving—you’re always “entertained” in different ways. I should note that this fun is only for people in the field with a warrior mindset. Whenever I had the chance to show what I do, how much gear I’m carrying, and how much health and energy I pour into training every day, I saw that not many people would actually want to swap places with me.
Q: It may come as a surprise that you became a yoga instructor. Why did you choose this practice, and did you see it as a kind of “mental cleansing” after so many years with URNA?
A: For many people, yoga is either just exercise or purely a spiritual matter. Fortunately, it can’t be one without the other. If I could go back in time, I’d definitely start yoga earlier. It’s a fantastic, balanced practice that brings equilibrium to the entire body. I’m very happy to be a member of the Hotyoga42 team, just as I was once a proud member of URNA. Yoga gave me many answers and helped me understand certain states experienced by my body. It’s a shame that so many of my students are women—everybody can benefit from yoga, and I hope that changes over time.
Working in the police helped me confront the demons of my youth. Put on the uniform, and suddenly you’re “somebody”; you receive new education and training, and your life changes fundamentally. Your original motivation for joining the police no longer matters. In the uniform, you feel that legal responsibility, and even if your superiors “nag” you with unpleasant tasks, you still want above all to help people.
Q: What exactly appealed to you about yoga, and what can a person find in it?
A: Everything. Yoga is extremely comprehensive. Once you manage to unite your will with your physical capability, you’re only a step away from connecting with your psyche—yes, I mean the spiritual part, the part we seldom talk about in gyms. What is will but the decision not to give up, a sense of belonging? You connect the physical with the emotional, and you start perceiving thoughts on a physical level. Many people will admit that they feel uneasy in someone’s presence, but they’d never say it’s because of that person’s energy. Often the word “spiritual” is a taboo. At our Hotyoga42 studio, we’re very diligent about helping everyone find their own path to each pose. It’s crucial that our students feel welcome and don’t have to be “embarrassed” if some poses are more difficult for them.
When I had the chance to meet a spiritual teacher from India and asked how he views our yoga, he told me we’re making a bit of a mess of it. He said yoga is like numbers on a calculator: nine digits plus zero, and everything else is just combinations. He sees the ego as the driving force behind new yoga styles. The foundational number of yoga postures is 84, and the goal was to bring body and mind into balance. I believe that Hatha Yoga, which we practice at Hotyoga42, fulfills that perfectly.
Q: You’re also an instructor on Life Support courses. How are Czechs doing with first aid—do they know how to act correctly when someone is injured or collapses?
A: Let me begin by saying it’s a great honor to work with the professionals at Life Support. The way they prepare for every seminar or exercise would be a valuable lesson for anyone in the field. My focus is on situations involving an “aggressor” or terrorism. I discuss with participants what their options and chances are in the scenarios we cover. The opportunity to test how I can and will react to situations resembling real-life emergencies—be they accidents, injuries, or otherwise—is an incredible experience. It’s also invaluable for rescuers.
In their professional world, they follow standards that most paramedics adhere to. I remember when the recommended numbers for chest compressions and breaths were different—that’s adjusted based on field experience. The Czech Republic truly has excellent first responders who work hard to educate the public on how to help others. They’ve greatly improved cooperation with the Red Cross to ensure people are as well informed as possible. The more people know how to save a life, the better it is for all of us as citizens. Whether we’re better or worse than others worldwide is irrelevant—I'm certain we're doing exceptionally well. Many people already know how to clear airways when someone isn’t breathing, can start chest compressions, and some even know what CPR stands for. The emergency operators are among the best internationally—they calmly guide you and help you in tense situations. I know a few of them personally and am immensely proud, because they’re wonderful people even off duty. So I believe our ability to save lives, compared globally, ranks at the very top.
SM přináší rozhovorem s bývalým příslušníkem elitní skupiny URNA Martinem Svozilem. Jaké požadavky musí člověk splnit, aby se mohl stát součástí tohoto útvaru, jak je důležité mentální nastavení, a čemu se Svozil věnuje dnes? To vše se dozvíte v našem rozhovoru.
