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Boardman company offers services in protection training
RELATED: Official: Libyan attack was a planned event
BOARDMAN
The U.S. ambassador to Libya and three diplomatic employees, killed in an attack of the American consulate in that country, couldn’t have done anything more to stop the deadly assault, said the executive director of a Boardman company that specializes in protection training for those doing business in hostile nations.
“What happened in Libya was like a flash-mob; it was so quick and overwhelming,” said Edwin Lard, executive director of the Diplomatic Protection Training Institute.
“What do you do when 200 to 300 people are coming at you unarmed? It’s like a tsunami. Every now and then, you can’t control the crowd. It looks like the right things were done, but there was nothing that could have stopped it.”
Regarding the Wednesday attack on the U.S. consulate facility in Libya — on the 11th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States — Lard said the best thing to do is gather people together quickly to get out of harm’s way.
But that’s not always something easy to do, he said.
Diplomatic officials are in countries to “be friendly and move toward a goal of promoting U.S. foreign policy with other nations,” Lard said.
The institute — based in Boardman with a training facility in Wampum, Pa. — provides training for corporate executives and others who do business in foreign nations on how “to avoid hostile environments,” Lard said.
Lard spent seven years as a State Department security protection specialist for diplomats in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Other officials with the institute have similar experience, he said.
The institute teaches its clients preventative tactics, ways to mitigate the risk of an attack and to always be aware that they can be potential targets, Lard said.
“American businessmen, particularly if they are wealthy, are targets for exploitation in hostile environments,” he said.
Even Americans going into dangerous countries to dig wells or help with agriculture are targets, Lard said.
“We help people hone their skills and be aware of things that are not right,” he said.
“We put people through a program that helps them focus on recognizing those situations and how to get out of them. It’s preventative. It’s risk mitigation.”