In light of the recent ballistic missile emergency alert error in Hawaii, I thought I would create a short post about the threat to international travellers in certain parts of the world. I think many of us have heard all the discussions around the direct ballistic missile threat from North Korea. However, it would be a huge act of an overt nature for them to actually wage war on another country by deploying Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles. In the current climate, the major immediate concern actually comes in the form of the testing of these missiles, as it happens much more often than a direct act of war.
Recently a friend of mine was deployed to Japan as part of a VIP Protection mission and experienced one of these incidents. As a protection professional, the challenges he faced was immense. Although, as an individual there was very little he could to protect his VIP from a missile (you can laugh here if you like), there were some questions needed to be asked leading up to the anticipated launch.
Questions like:
- How often do the tests happen?
- Have they ever hit land and if not how close have they come?
- How much warning do they get and how are people informed?
- What measures are in place to protect against these attacks and/or mitigate the impact?
- What is the potential impact to normal business operations like flight delays, etc. when a launch is imminent?
Again, as an individual that travels frequently, this is a significant threat that could have grave impact on the safety of those under my care. I might not be able to stop a missile (yet), but I must be aware of the threat before I can take steps to protect against it.
Hopefully you will never find yourself in a situation where you are at risk of ballistic missiles, either from direct act of war or testing of weaponry. Either way, awareness as a first step will help ask questions, guide decisions and take whatever protective action or mitigation methods available.
Here is a short video on this threat based on a recent incident.
And, if you have more time and room for further information on the subject, below is a more lengthy video on the subject.
We intentionally do not cover protective measures or mitigation steps in our threat awareness posts, as we like to keep them short and focus on the existence of the threat instead. However, we would love to hear your thoughts on the matter.
Use the comments below to tell us your protective measures or anything else you would like to say on the subject.
Please share this post with someone you think could benefit from knowing about this threat.
Threat Awareness is a regular blog post by SpecVIP Protection Group Inc. Awareness of threats is the first step towards protecting yourself and your VIP (How you define VIP is up to you) from the risk posed by these threats. Some of these posts might be obvious or obscure, they also maybe common or rare. Either way you must be aware of them before you can begin to protect against them.
