Leader: there is more than one Games monitor
Military exercises take place in advance of the Olympics, Blackheath, 3 May 2012. Photograph: Adam Barnett
With talk of surface-to-air missiles, checkpoints and police watchtowers, it’s no wonder critics of the London Olympics have been having a field day with frightening news stories about security surrounding the event.
These critics have included those who might be described as the usual suspects such as writer Iain Sinclair, but, significantly, the dystopian spectre of a military style lockdown in the capital has sent a shiver of fear through a far wider spectrum of people.
Radio shows have been full of callers slamming the Soviet-style chutzpah of the Ministry of Defence (MoD), who wrote to residents of one east London estate claiming that a plan to install surface-to-air missiles on a tower block roof would help prevent the area from being targeted by terrorists.
Not unreasonably, inhabitants of the block countered that they did not really consider their building to be a terrorist target but that it would no doubt become one if commandeered by the MoD in such a way.
Mike Wells, a journalist who has been chronicling preparations for the Olympics via the website Games Monitor, has long warned about the dangers of such controversial militarisation.
“During the Olympics there will be the highest concentration of firearms in this country ever,” he said in an interview last month.
13,000 military personnel, 13,000 police officers and at peak times 23,000 security personnel supplied by a private company will be on duty.
The River Thames will be patrolled by Royal Navy battleships with laser-guided missiles and the RAF are, according to some reports, considering deploying pilotless drones fitted with laser-guided bombs.
“The Americans are coming with 1,000 of their own agents and military personnel including 500 FBI agents,” added Mr Wells. “The Israelis will probably be bringing their own personnel. There will also be private security teams belonging to the sponsors.”
The predictions of the prophets of doom have hardly been dispelled by the hard line taken towards peaceful protesters who exercised their democratic rights and set up camp at Leyton Marsh, where Olympic chiefs are paving paradise to put up a basketball court that they insist will be temporary.
Metropolitan Police sources say the received wisdom is that “something is going to happen” during the Games, by which they mean something bad, and Scotland Yard clearly wishes to take no chances.
This is understandable, and while it is clear that the police must be well organised and tough to keep the city safe at such high profile times, a balance must be struck between such steps and fuelling hysteria and nightmares.
Treating London like it is a war zone is at odds with the cuddly image of the Olympics mascots and, what’s more, it would seem to be unnecessary.
Of course no one really knows what impact the Games will have, particularly in our corner of the capital, where the bulk of the events will be centred, but where’s the evidence that they will be targetted by violent extremists?
The indications are that the views of the Olympics naysayers and doom mongers should not be dismissed lightly. London 2012 is meant to be a sports event, but at present it does indeed look all too much like a joyless security operation with a little bit of sport tacked onto it.
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