Executive Protection
1. Introduction
Threat to life is integral to a competitive society, wherein people, communities, and nations have different and often conflicting objectives. This often results in antagonism and the option of willingly causing bodily harm to another person has increasingly become an acceptable and valid proposition. The twentieth century has been a watershed of sorts in the history of global violence and has been witness to conflict on a gigantic scale. Two drawn out and disastrous world wars, dramatic developments in weapons technology, both conventional and nuclear, the gradual and often bloody evolution of a militarily unipolar society, the depredations of fanatical dictators, and the rise of global terrorism have made the world an infinitely dangerous place.
Nothing illustrates this situation better than the horrific attacks of September 11, when, a group of brilliant and fanatical Islamic terrorists struck dramatically, at 9 in the morning, at the heart of New York City, killing thousands of civilians, and bringing down the Twin Towers, a glorious symbol of American affluence. Osama bin Laden, operating from a remote base in one of the most primitive areas of the world, with the help of a handful of deeply motivated strike soldiers, and a shoestring budget, had been able to do what Rommel's Panzers, Goering's Wehrmacht and Hirohito's Kamikaze squadrons could not think of achieving; a lethal strike at the nerve centre of the United States. The concept of safety changed with the September 11 strikes as Americans realized that even the White House could be hit.
While the Americans, supported by the British, responded to the 9/11 attacks, and to the challenge of terrorism with unprecedented ferocity, both in Afghanistan and in I ...