The Olympic opening ceremony in Los Angeles is on July 14, 2028, less than 22 months away. The Games are a National Special Security Event. The House Homeland Security Committee has described the load as “seven Super Bowls daily for 16 consecutive days”. Drone defense is the most important component with the least time left to get right.

Three recent events frame the LA security challenge. At Paris in 2024, French police intercepted 53 drones near Olympic sites in the first week. At Milano Cortina this February, the director of the State Department’s major events security division called drones “a massive issue”. At the World Cup this summer, the Pentagon’s counter-drone task force detected roughly 1,700 unauthorized drones over host cities and seized about 700 of them. Before the tournament, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin told Congress: “The biggest concern I have is, honestly, with drone defense. It is one of the areas that we are struggling with every single day.” Earlier, eight drones had breached the airspace at the Miami Grand Prix and twelve at the Masters.

The World Cup operation worked because of the level and approach to interagency coordination and training. The military, the FBI, DHS, and........

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