Security? Sochi Olympics made for militants

WASHINGTON – Complacency over security procedures has set in at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, prompting security analysts to suggest that this is the opening Islamist militants have been waiting for to launch threatened attacks.

The evidence of the lax attitude toward security contradicts the idea of the so-called "ring of steel" initially set up to encompass some 1,500 square miles of the Sochi Olympic and mountain villages.

Reports persist that three so-called "black widows" who are wives of Islamist "martyrs" and are potential suicide bombers may already have penetrated that "ring," which Moscow created using upward of 80,000 troops and police to enforce security.

These black widows still have not been found. The concern is that these women who would be suicide bombers are just waiting for the right moment to launch attacks.

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That time may be fast approaching, judging by the report of lax security.

There also is concern that Islamist militants may choose soft targets away from the Olympics where large groups of people gather, such as shopping centers and in transportation centers which already have been the primary targets of the Islamist fighters.

Given this laxity in security, the opportunity for attacks may increase, since the Sochi Games are not due to end until Feb. 23.

The threats of attacks come from Islamists from the North Caucasus region encompassing the southern Russian provinces of Chechnya, Ingushetia, Dagestan, Kabardino-Balkaria and Karachay-Cherkessia. These provinces are only a few hundred miles from Sochi which is located on the Black Sea.

The Islamist fighters are at war with Moscow, since they want to create a Caucasus Emirates subject to Shariah law in the predominantly Muslim provinces and break with Russia altogether.

People of the North Caucasus have been waging a conflict with Moscow for almost two centuries but their cause has become more prominent ever since Russian President Vladimir Putin launched two wars in Chechnya, in 1994 and again in 1999.

The leader of the Caucasus Emirates, Dokku Umarov, has called for attacks to disrupt the "satan" games.

In recent days, there have been increasing reports that security has become more lax, especially at checkpoints where security guards check bags and effects of people entering the Olympic facilities.

Fruits and bottles apparently are being allowed without checks, even though they were banned just two weeks ago.

Hotel guests report that they are walking unchecked past unused metal detectors.

One Associated Press report said that visitors are making it through metal detectors with coins, keys, watches and belts. At one hotel, which was not named, along the Sochi shore, metal detectors didn’t appear to be used at all, even after a visitor with a bag was waved through without a check.

At other locations, there are reports that guards are letting through backpacks containing pocket knives, water bottles, fruit and shampoo without a security check.

Guards appear to be increasingly laid back, many preoccupied with being on their mobile phones or listening to music while at their posts.

Separate reports say that many of the Russian police have not been paid in weeks despite the $51 billion spent to build and secure the Olympics. At least half of that amount, experts say, disappeared due to corruption.

Guards, however, have been particularly watchful of demonstrators, particularly from "gay" rights activists, who are immediately swooped up and taken away, or those who want to call attention to abuses by Russian authorities.

Sources say that would-be terrorists likely would assume the appearance of visitors making them indistinguishable from the thousands of spectators. Suicide bombers may not fit pre-determined profiles. To deflect attention, they may be men, dressed in sports outfits but without backpacks and wearing parkas to hide any suicide bomb vest.