Be Excellent To Each Other

To discourage potential suicide bombers.

Those won't be the real missiles, they'll be someone else. This'll just be a bunch of squaddies drinking tea around some some khaki painted drainpipes and a "radar station" made of old Sky dishes and old scaffolding. It's all a clever misinformation campaign, you see!

Yes, clearly terrorists will be using fast jets or helicopter gunships to make attacks on Da 'Lympics. Very common tactic by the terrorists. The IRA are probably fueling up their F-16s as we speak.

Or people drinking Pepsi

Maybe the residents will get to keep them after the Olympics to deter burglars.

They leaflet dropped the building saying "we are going to put missiles on your roof, is that ok?"
Unsurprisingly, someone posted a pic of the leaflet on twitter, and so the media circus started.

Intentional? Cock-up? Not thinking things through? Don't care?
Who knows, but it seems it was never intended to be a secret.

Quite. A story like this tells the world that 'we're doing something' without disclosing anything sensitive.

Not sure if Kern Hall could do with some castellations, mind.

If I was cynical, I'd suggest it was the army using Da 'Lympics as an excuse to get more gear. 'we clearly need some more MANPADS, and there's definitely a need for some tanks for routine patrols, oh and what are those big gunships the yanks use... Yeah, you'll need like, three of those'

Why Wembley?

Intended as a deterrent, I reckon. I'm not even 100% convinced that the ammunition will be live.

In other news, Dwayne Chambers has been cleared to run. Thoughts?

At least there will be one clean athlete in the race...

I've played and completed Ace Combat on the 360... Missile installations are easy to destroy and won't help in any way where we're in the middle of a war while trying to run the Olympics.

Now I've got an image in my mind of there being a massive war going on all over the country while the games carry on regardless. Imagine the sound of explosions going off while someone is trying to throw a javelin... Amazing.

It was the first sporting arena in London I thought of.

Why don't they just test everyone? Considering the amount of people and organisation the Olympics takes, I'm not quite sure why they don't just take samples from every competitor.

There's about 10500 athletes taking part according to Wikipedia. That's a lot of people to test.

it's nowhere near the main Olympic village and where most of the events will be, and well out of the 5km range of where those missiles are stationed.

They should just abandon all testing and see how quick people can really go.

yes, it is... But it's also a lot of people to provide accommodation, translators, transport, food, (etc, etc, etc) for. They can organise all of those things for 10,000 people, they can also collect little bottles of wee from them.

or that. See what drugs can really do. Though of course people will be dropping at a higher rate than Grand National horses.

My grasp of London's geography is loose, at best. So much so, mrsA sent grim... a message explaining how that if I don't turn up at his gaff, I've probably gotten myself in a pickle on the underground, or have gone to Hammersmith as I've heard of that. Much to the room's amusement on my tardy arrival.

no, I just WINDEREX if you'd heard somewhere that there were other missiles being positioned in/near Wembley as my family live around that way and I was going to ask my brothers if they'd heard anything about it.

Who are the Official Missile Suppliers to the London 2012 Olympics anyway?

They could always bang some tunes on to catch out all the cheats.

"When I'm cleaning windows"

Alexander Popov.

They could easily test everyone, but then there wouldn't be much of a games left. The 100m final would be between the cleaner and a cameraman.

All medal winning athletes are tested. Since nobody cares about people other than the winners, this seems sufficient.

Of course, tests can be beaten, but that's another story.

So, who wins here? Not the people who don't take drugs, not those that do and get caught, just those that cheat and don't get caught... Not great.

Test every person, ban them, next year: no cheats.

Test every person, ban them, next year: better cheats.

it's a methodology that has served the TdF well.

Was he not handed a lifetime ban?

right... It's complicated.

The IOC rule that there should be a minimum 2 year ban for drugs cheats. Though this is the rule, each country has its own standards on what criteria it's athletes should meet to be eligible to compete. One of the criteria for team GB is that the athlete must never have tested positive for banned performance enhancing drugs. Therefore, for British athletes, it represents a lifetime ban FROM THE OLYMPICS if caught. We have the strictest rules on this in the world, and over 800 former cheats will be competing from other countries.

Chambers has gone via some European sport committee to overturn the British criteria for eligibility, and won, therefore that criteria no longer has any power.

And life in general, says Darwin.

Tests are changed each year, too. If drugs could ride above the tests then people would take those ones rather than the ones that could be detected.

That's fine, except who does it deter? If there was a terrorist attack on Da 'Lympics, it would mostly be one of the usual suicide/car/some-other-type-of bomb or West Bank Style mortar attack, with the outside chance of crazed gunman or some sort of gas attack. Surface-to-air missiles, or indeed military jets overhead, would be pretty much useless.

I was thinking, how many Olympic games have had surface to air missle installed in the past? And how many have had a call to use them?

Given the protection the Olympics afford to sponsors, and the accuracy of these things, all I'm saying is don't try to drink a Pepsi in the Olympic Stadium, OK?

In 6th Century BC the Ancient Athenians were forced to shoot down a Boeing 737 that the Corinthians had hijacked.

Presumably to protect against hijacked aircraft used as weapons. An airliner blown apart over the city would be catastrophic but not as bad if it was crashed into a packed stadium. It seems an entirely sensible and inevitable precaution to me and I don't see what the fuss is about. It's like people are hearing the word MISSILES and then running around screaming with their hands on their heads.

Also unnecessary given the Olympic Truce.

Well, a couple of things. Firstly, you could cause a catastrophic incident with a hijacked airliner over London at pretty much any time. I'm not entirely convinced an olympic stadium represents a better target than eg the Houses of Parliament.

Secondly, it's missiles being placed on the roof of a block of flats. That would sure as hell make me nervous if I lived there.

Thirdly, it's that old thing again of "you always fight the last war". Hijacked airliners was a one-shot deal that was horrifyingly effective. It wouldn't be again.

I don't think it's the rockets that people are objecting to per se, merely the absolutely ginormous milk bottles that are used for their sticks, in order to launch?


Standard Fireworks

--- Hellfire Missile ---

Size 12 with Animated Stars
DO NOT HOLD

Ensure rocket is free to rise. Light blue touchpaper and retire immediately. Ejects bangs.

Firstly I'm not sure I agree, purely in terms of loss of life then there has to be no better target than the Olympic stadium. Also London already has anti air missile batteries, this is just some additional protection.

Secondly, if that's the best place for them to be then that's where they should go. And if I lived there I don't think it would make me nervous. What is there to be nervous about?

Thirdly this is not "fighting the last war" they aren't just putting these missiles on a rooftop and doing nothing else. It is just not completely ignoring one possible threat, terrorists have hijacked airliners quite a few times, it was far from a "one shot deal". Also, why would it not be effective again? If someone did manage to hijack an airliner and crash it into the stadium it would be a right mess. This is deploying a few men with some missiles we already own, I don't think that the actual chances of such an attack need to be very high before it becomes a sensible thing to do.

That your house is now a military target, perhaps?

Well, I certainly have no intention of bombing the Olympics after hearing this, so it must be working.

Equal to Old Trafford, which is hosting Olympic events. Manchester will, of course, be receiving the same amount of security support for this essential service in order for it not to be a whole bunch of security theatre. (Sub: Please check.)

Missile sites announced! We could make a goole maps "mash-up" with a "Do you live within range of an Olympic missile?" type thing!

Does that define whether you are a "proper Cockney" or not?