UK: Numerous VIPs to Have Police Bodyguards Disarmed

Large numbers of VIPs including politicians, diplomats and junior members of the Royal Family are to have their close protection officers disarmed, with their pistols replaced with the taser and baton carried by most British beat cops. Scotland Yard has approved the plan, code named Option 5, as a cost cutting measure. The Queen, Prince of Wales and Prince William are expected to retain armed protection. Presumably, so will the Prime Minister.

Details.

I really don't think this is a good idea. If someone is important enough to rate police protection, their cpo needs to be armed. In a really serious event an unarmed bodyguard will be useless... at best. In the event of a determined attack there is a good chance they will simply be killed. I understand that security is expensive. The amount of money spent guarding people on this side of the pond is astronomical. And there are likely a lot of people who just don't need that. Fine. Quietly drop the protection. But security is not something you do by half measures. Lives are involved, and not just those of the protectees. Do it right, or don't do it at all.

Obama looking to avoid Waldorf hotel in New York after Chinese purchase

Every president since Franklin D. Roosevelt has stayed in the presidential suite on the 35th floor of the Waldorf Astoria New York in Manhattan. The accommodations run $4,000-$6,000 per night, hotel officials say, and feature souvenirs collected from past commanders in chief and security measures like bulletproof glass windows. Current and former White House officials have long considered the hotel and its staff as the best in the world at hosting the most powerful man in the world.

That may all be about to change. President Barack Obama is on track to skip the Waldorf this fall when he heads to New York for the annual United Nations General Assembly, several officials told Yahoo News.

While the officials would not say so explicitly, they strongly indicated that the decision to reevaluate the historic relationship with the Waldorf was tied to the hotel’s sale to China’s Anbang Insurance Group, approved by U.S. regulators earlier this year. While Hilton will continue to operate the property for 100 years, one U.S. official linked the American decision to relocate the president to worries about Chinese espionage and to the announcement of an upcoming “major renovation” at the hotel that could provide an opportunity to install surveillance gear. The recent theft of millions of federal workers’ personal information, pinned on China, has fed the sense of alarm in Washington. China denies responsibility for the breach.

Read the rest here.

A sad, but probably necessary decision.

Pope Francis Sacks Commander of Swiss Guards

The commander of the Swiss Guard at the Vatican has been removed from his post, apparently as a result of Pope Francis’s unease at the security chief’s militaristic style... 

...The pope’s apparent discomfort with the gruelling shifts and strict rules of the Swiss Guard, which were enforced by Anrig, has been evident since his election in 2013. Italian press reports said the pontiff wanted to see a less rigid military corp and one that was less obsessed by rules.

Read the rest here.

Now that's the ticket. Because everyone knows that the surest foundation stone for a crack military/security service is lax discipline.

It is perhaps worth noting that assassination, like larceny, is primarily a crime of opportunity. Heads of state and other VIPs who insist on moving about in open cars, without bodyguards or who deliberately keep their security at bay are worse than fools. This is because ordinary people can choose to take foolish risks, and in most cases the danger is primarily or exclusively to them alone. But when you are a pope, president or king you are almost never alone in public. The assassin spraying bullets or setting off a bomb is not going to worry about "collateral damage." In the modern world the opposite is more likely to be the case. If you have a martyr complex, that's fine. But you don't have the right to endanger other people by your actions.

The Secret Service Under Fire

It's been a tough year for the Secret Service. One after another the hits just keep coming for one of the most legendary law enforcement agencies out there. Their job description requires among other things, a readiness to step between the person they are protecting and anyone or thing that may pose a danger to their principal. In the most extreme case they would be expected to use their bodies as human shields and "take the bullet" meant for the President. (At least one agent has done exactly that.) And for 113 years they have, with one truly horrific exception, kept the President's of this country safe from harm despite several close calls.

But now we have people openly questioning whether they are up to the job after a series of scandals and revelations of embarrassing security lapses. Recently an armed man not only jumped the White House fence but managed to force his way into the Executive Mansion itself where he ran amok until finally tackled by an off duty agent.

Possibly though, the most alarming revelation has just made it into the open. Two weeks ago an armed man with a violent criminal record, who somehow had acquired a job as security contractor for the CDC, managed to ride an elevator with President Obama! That's crazy.

Worst Op-Ed of the Month

OK, there are still a few days left in September. But I am calling it game over and handing this month's prize to Dan Emmett for this piece promoting a further militarization of our society and law enforcement. I won't even touch who he wants to put in charge of protecting the President of the United States.

Dear America, I Saw You Naked

And yes, we were laughing. Confessions of an ex-TSA agent.

HT: Bill (aka The Godfather)

Mandela Security Scandal: It was worse than we thought

It's becoming increasingly clear that when President Obama arrived at the Nelson Mandela memorial service in Johannesburg, South Africa Tuesday, he stepped into an atmosphere so chaotic, disorganized, and unsafe that under any other circumstances the White House and Secret Service might well have insisted the president not appear.

FNB Stadium, where the memorial was held, seats 95,000 people. Even with a steady rain and thousands of empty seats in uncovered areas, there were tens of thousands of people in the area with the president. It appears most of them got in without going through any security.

"There were no security checks upon entry to the stadium," a local South African activist wrote Friday in a letter to the Johannesburg Star newspaper. "I walked freely to my seat without passing through metal detectors, being searched or any other check."

The stadium's main entrance was "completely unattended," a reporter for a Washington, D.C., television station told Politico. "There were no workers performing bag checks or pat-downs — there were no magnetometers to walk through, no metal detector wands being used — anywhere."

Read the rest here.

In the Navy we had a term for this sort of thing... FUBAR.

No, I'm not going to break that down.

Bizarre

JOHANNESBURG — The sign language interpreter who gestured meaninglessly at the Nelson Mandela memorial in South Africa on Tuesday has faced charges of murder, rape, theft, breaking and entering, malicious damage to property and kidnapping, according to eNCA.com.

The South African news site said the outcome of the murder charge against Thamsanqa Jantjie, brought in 2003, was unknown because the court case file is “mysteriously empty.”

Read the rest here.

I imagine that the Secret Service must be flipping out over this.

US Issues Security Alert For Embassies - Travelers

The State Department issued a worldwide travel alert Friday, warning of potential terrorist attacks by al-Qaeda and its affiliates in the Middle East and North Africa that could target tourists on trains, flights or other forms of public transportation.

The alert follows the decision to close 21 U.S. embassies across the Muslim world on Sunday in response to the same security threat, according to State Department officials.

“Current information suggests that al-Qaeda and affiliated organizations continue to plan terrorist attacks both in the region and beyond, and that they may focus efforts to conduct attacks in the period between now and the end of August,” the State Department said in a statement Friday. It said the potential for attacks was particularly high in the Middle East and North Africa and that it could come from or occur on the Arabian Peninsula.

Read the rest here.

Security on alert as Pope Francis heads to Brazil

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil – When Pope Francis greets his flock on Rio’s white-sand Copacabana beach this week during his first international trip, he’ll do so in the same open-topped jeep “popemobile” he uses at the Vatican, breaking down the bulletproof barrier between the pontiff and the people.

But while he'll be traveling with only two Swiss Guards dressed in discreet civilian clothes, the "people's pope" may still have a hard time connecting with the 2 million people expected to greet him. More than 10,000 army, air force and navy officers, as well as 12,000 regular police and 1,700 elite security forces, will guard him during his 18 public appearances during his weeklong visit, starting Monday, to Brazil for World Youth Day. 

Read the rest here.

Senator Rand Paul detained by TSA

Senator Rand Paul, R-Ky., has reportedly clashed with the Transportation Security Administration at a Nashville airport, according to tweets from his press aide and father, Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul.

At about 10 a.m. ET, Paul's press aide, Moira Bagley wrote: Just got a call from @senrandpaul. He's currently being detained by TSA in Nashville.

Soon after, Ron Paul wrote: My son @SenRandPaul being detained by TSA for refusing full body pat-down after anomaly in body scanner in Nashville. More details coming.

NBC News' Kelly O'Donnell reports that aides to Sen. Paul say he set off a full-body scanning machine while going through airport security Monday morning.

Read the rest here.

Officials warn of cyber sabotage and spyware on foreign software being imported into the US

Confirming years of warnings from government and private security experts, a top Homeland Security official has acknowledged that computer hardware and software is already being imported to the United States preloaded with spyware and security-sabotaging components.

The remarks by Greg Schaffer, the Department of Homeland Security's acting deputy undersecretary for national protection and programs, came Thursday during a tense exchange at a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. The panel is considering an Obama administration proposal to tighten monitoring and controls on computer equipment imported for critical government and communications infrastructure.

Schaffer didn't say whether the equipment he was talking about included end-user consumer tech like retail laptops, DVDs and media players. If so, his comments, first reported Friday morning by Fast Company, would be the first time the United States has publicly confirmed that foreign consumer technology is arriving in the country already loaded with nasty bugs like key-logging software, botnet components and even software designed to defeat security programs installed on the same machine.

Read the rest here.

Britain: New Prime Minister is resisting the security bubble

The guys with wires coming out of their ears are there for a reason...

David Cameron is rejecting the advice of top security officials by insisting on walking around Whitehall, refusing police motorcycle escorts and demanding to be allowed to keep his BlackBerry smartphone.

There is increasing nervousness about the protection of the Prime Minister, who officials believe is making himself vulnerable to terrorists, lone obsessives and cyber-criminals.

Security analysis would suggest that if Mr Cameron is more vulnerable to attack, then the ministers and police officers walking with him, and the members of the public around him, are also at greater risk. Deeper concerns have been expressed that his actions undermine the Government’s message on national security. The MI5 threat assessment is now at “severe”, meaning that an attack is highly likely.

Read the rest here.

I empathize with Mr. Cameron. Nobody wants to live their life in a bulletproof goldfish bowl, no matter how comfortable the bowl might be. But some things have to be put up with, and in his job security is near the top of that list. The article is correct in noting that when VIP's step outside the security bubble they are not just putting themselves at risk. They put all of those in their vicinity in danger as well. It's not fair but that's the way things are.

When he first took office President Reagan bristled at the constant presence of his Secret Service minders and one evening complained aloud about being "crowded" by them. The senior agent responded matter-of-factly "Mr. President, we are like Hail to the Chief. We come with the job." Several weeks later that agent (Jerry Parr) body slammed President Reagan into his bulletproof car as a madman tried (and nearly succeeded) to kill him outside the Washington Hilton Hotel. Three other people were gravely wounded in that attack.

Memo to anyone seeking high political office: The guys in suits and sunglasses with wires coming out of their ears are not stage props. If you don't want them around, consider another line of work.