PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer
PAUL NUSSBAUM
LAST UPDATED: Sunday, August 9, 2015
The massive security efforts planned for next month’s papal visit to Philadelphia are unnecessarily burdensome and might not be effective, according to some security and counterterrorism experts.
The closure of major highways and bridges for more than two days, a three-square-mile traffic-free zone in Center City, restricted transit access, and the closing of offices and businesses “is a disproportional reaction,” said Scott White, a former security agent for the Canadian government and now a professor of homeland security and security management at Drexel University.
“What are we attempting to do here? Are we attempting to protect the pontiff, who already has – and always has – rings of security? Or are we attempting to protect one million or two million people?”
“We can’t protect 40 people in a cinema,” White said, referring to the spate of recent theater shootings. “How are we going to protect two million people?”
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.