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The Pope's shooting brought one predictable result: security forces around the world began studying the case for lessons. "We are now analyzing the attempt on the Pope," says Günter Ermisch, a top security expert for West Germany. After the attack on President Reagan, Canadian authorities doubled the guard around Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau; they now clear the doorways of Parliament for five minutes before he arrives or leaves. The Secret Service refuses to say what new procedures it has adopted to protect President Reagan, but security is clearly heavier than it used to be.
Last week terrorists of the Provisional wing of the Irish Republican Army set off a bomb at a British Petroleum complex while the Queen was near by, reminding Britain that both its oil terminals and its royalty are highly vulnerable. Since the shooting of the Pope, the London press has complained about poor security for the Queen. One sign of the times: both Elizabeth II and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher appear heavier in recent photographs, and it is assumed that they sometimes wear bulletproof vests.
Fear of assassination may cut down foreign travel by politicians. Fifty African heads of state are due in Nairobi next month for a summit meeting, but according to one diplomat, "Kenya will be lucky if it gets even a third of the total." Australia, which has already committed $14 million for massive security at October's Commonwealth Conference in Melbourne, ordered a fresh review of plans after John Paul's shooting.
Ottawa is borrowing soldiers, customs officials and narcotics investigators to beef up security for July's Western economic summit. At least 2,500 security agents will be swarming around the conference, including some hiding in the brush by the river and some disguised as fishermen in canoes.
It is not only Popes, Presidents and Prime Ministers who feel threatened. Since John Lennon's murder, entertainers have an increased sense of vulnerability. Businessmen worry about kidnapings—of their families if not themselves. The result is a boom time for firms that discreetly offer protection at a price. These security firms offer little information on who their clients are and how they protect them. Some means are obvious: guard dogs, electronic sensors and scanners, highly trained chauffeurs driving armor-plated limousines.
"We're selling a lot more bulletproof vests than we did a year ago," says a spokesman for CCS Communication Control, Inc. "And these are going to regular businessmen, not someone who is a bodyguard or in law enforcement." In 1978 the company turned a new Cadillac into a James Bond car for the Shah of Iran, adding a bomb sniffer, ducts that sprayed tear gas, machine-gun mounts and enough armor plate to withstand a grenade or a land mine. After he lost the Peacock Throne, the Shah refused title to the car, forfeiting a $50,000 deposit.
Tom O'Gara, of