Hindsight, they say, is always 20/20. While the Japanese National Police Agency is all set to investigate possible flaws in security of former PM Shinzo Abe, who was assassinated by a military veteran on Friday in Nara, the video footage of the shooting from various angles reveals that the protectors could certainly have done a better job.
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Reports from Japan indicate that the assassin shot the Japanese leader not for any political motives or his nationalism, but that Abe supported an unspecified organization. The epicaricacy of the Chinese propaganda media over the death of Japanese leader may be downright crass even though Abe raised Beijing’s hackles by coming out in support of Taiwan and was one of the founders of QUAD and the Indo-Pacific alliance. He was the man whom the Chinese hated, and India loved even after he had demitted the office of Prime Minister of Japan.
Abe not only cemented strategic ties with New Delhi but also helped recognize Buddhist sites in India by helping resurrect the Nalanda University in Rajgir in Bihar. By attending the Ganga Aarti in 2017 at Varanasi with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he linked Hinduism with Buddhism, which Beijing has been trying to co-opt for decades through client states Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. Back to the assassination.
The multiple video footages of events leading to Abe’s assassination reveal some basic flaws in VVIP protection protocol unless one believes that there was no security threat to the former PM as Japan is a pacifist country. If that be the case,then there was no need for armed security detail.
{{/usCountry}}The multiple video footages of events leading to Abe’s assassination reveal some basic flaws in VVIP protection protocol unless one believes that there was no security threat to the former PM as Japan is a pacifist country. If that be the case,then there was no need for armed security detail.
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First, there appeared to be no perimeter protection for Abe as his assassin carrying a homemade shotgun with a short barrel in a black bag was standing just behind the leader in very close proximity.
Second, the security detail of Abe was looking towards the protectee speak at the train station in Nara rather than keeping an eye on the possible threat coming from the opposite direction. Clearly, the trained armed guards appeared to be as surprised by the attack as the innocent bystanders gathered to hear Abe campaign for the Sunday’s election to the house of councilors.
Third, the video footage shows a time lag between the first discharge from the shotgun, which missed the leader as he turned towards the direction of the gunshot and commotion, and then took the second fatal shot in his chest. After the first missed shot, the bodyguards should have blocked the line of fire by bodily protecting the target and escort Abe to safety. Instead, video footage reveals, the guards ran towards the assassin leaving Abe unprotected. This gave the assassin enough time to take the second shot which proved fatal.
The video footage shows that there was no attempt to neutralize the assassin after the first shot as subsequently published photos show that none of the armed guards had even drawn out their weapons. Clearly, the security detail of Abe had no idea about lone wolf threats and obviously there was no intelligence input to that effect. After the excesses of World War II, Japan has turned a pacifist peaceful nation with "pacifist" enshrined in its constitution. The country is one of the safest in the world.
The assassination of Abe, perhaps the tallest post-war leaders of Japan, is a wake-up call for those whose job is to protect VVIPs in the democratic world where the politician-people interaction is integral to winning electoral mandate. The assassination of Abe should be a lesson to those protecting global leaders like Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, US President Joe Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron and many others, as lone wolf and guerilla surprise attacks, have been and will continue to be a nightmare for the protectors. The assasin will always have the advantage of choosing their time, place and weapon. Perhaps multiple layers of security with zone perimeter protection using sensor based metal detectors, surveillance as well as anti-drones could be an answer to ensure better survivability of the target. Had such protection been given to Shinzo Abe, success chances of the assasin Yamagami would have been very low.