The devastating effects of natural disasters force the international community to develop initiatives to alleviate the shortcomings that the governments face at the beginning for a prompt restoration of critical services and infrastructures and the protection of the population. The goal of these initiatives is to achieve more effective coordination between all the actors involved – civil and military – in emergency management.

Spain became a pioneer nation when UME was created, since it provided a solution to this problem. UME has caught the attention of other nations and international organizations and has become a role model in the use of military forces in emergencies.

The efficiency in all its interventions has turned UME into an international reference unit. This idea has been reinforced by the Royal Decree 1097/2011, which establishes the Protocol of Intervention of the Emergency Military Unit and gives the power to the Spanish Minister of Defense "to dictate the necessary regulations for the operational conditions that apply to the participation of UME in operations abroad”.

UME obtained the United Nations classification for Urban Search and Rescue (USAR), which allowed the unit to participate in international operations, to present the project in international forums and to strengthen the relationship with the Ibero-American countries.

UME also participates, through the Directorate General of Civil Protection and Emergencies, in the European Union Civil Protection Mechanism, with the means and capabilities offered by Spain to this mechanism. In February 2014, the administrative process by which new intervention modules and a list of experts were offered to the EU Civil Protection Mechanism to respond to potential catastrophes inside and outside the EU was completed. This contributed to the standardization and interoperability with other European emergency teams, as well as the external visibility of UME in the event of deployments to operations led by the European Union.

The modules offered by UME are urban search and rescue in average conditions, urban search and rescue in extreme conditions, search and rescue in situations of CBRN contamination, water search and rescue, temporary emergency shelters, sampling and detecting CBRN, ground forest fire fighting, ground forest fire fighting using vehicles, flood containment and flood rescue.