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Without question, the Pope's trip had posed logistical and security challenges that dwarfed even last summer's royal wedding. Security preparations for his public appearances were the most elaborate that Britain had ever mounted. The police were clearly anticipating publicity-seeking demonstrations, and perhaps even ugly scuffles designed to embarrass the Pope and tarnish the ecumenical gloss of the visit. Most Britons support the Pope's trip, but Special Branch police were watchful of a faction of anti-Pope fanatics, especially in Liverpool and Glasgow. "We are expecting trouble," said one security spokesman.
The security forces were also preoccupied with the possibility of an assassination attempt by some demented person acting alone—a fear heightened by the shooting of John Paul last year in St. Peter's Square by a Turkish terrorist and the attempt on his life last month in Portugal by a bayonet-wielding dissident priest. The Pope's special $400,000 yellow-and-white security vehicles—dubbed the four Popemo-biles—contained engineering features originally developed to defend vehicles against Catholic terrorists in Northern Ireland.
After all this planning, the decision to go was made just two weeks ago. The Falklands crisis passed over the Vatican like the materialization of some dreaded, unexpected schism, making for intense debate in the highest councils of the church. Before John Paul's dramatic Mass for peace at the Vatican the weekend before last, with both British and Argentine Cardinals concelebrating, the lines were well formed. Arrayed in favor from the start were the British bishops. Opposed were key members of the Curia—and, most notably, Archbishop Ubaldo Calabresi, the papal nuncio in Argentina. Backing Calabresi were the Pope's top aide, Secretary of State Agostino Cardinal Casaroli; Archbishop Achille Silvestrini, his "foreign minister," who had once favored the trip but turned against the idea when the battles began; and Sebastiano Cardinal Baggio, prefect of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America. In a business-as-usual decision, such a power bloc would have won hands down. But this was an unusual situation, and John Paul is no rule-book Pontiff. Inside Vatican corridors, officials only half jokingly use the term the Panzer, for a Pope whose mind can be made up blitzkrieg-fast—and once made up, stay that way.
The British Catholic hierarchy was glum about the likelihood of a papal visit at a time of war, but a great deal was at stake. Very quickly, the British hierarchy launched a shuttle diplomacy effort designed to counteract the advice it knew the Pope was receiving from the ever cautious Curia. Archbishops Thomas Winning of Glasgow and Derek Worlock of Liverpool flew to Rome and at a hastily arranged luncheon in the Pope's private apartments, made a carefully prepared appeal, but it was soon clear that they were preaching to the converted. "I am convinced myself," the Pope said, according to one participant.