Games stifled by over-the-top security, what drives it?

Australian Olympic Committee president, John Coates, blames post 9/11 for the excess security measures.

As Australian Olympic Committee president John Coates pointed out yesterday, heavy security is a grim fact of life at every Olympics, post 9-11.

The reality is more akin to terror of the truth of the regime being uncovered.

For seven years, since Beijing won the right to host the Games, China's Communist regime has been terrified of what the world might see - and think - when it arrived.
So they did what was natural to an authoritarian regime.

They shut everyone out. They built high fences and security barricades. And they flooded the city with security forces and spies.

I think it's more the fear of looking bad than the fear of terrorism post 9/11 which drives the high security in Beijing.

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