Extra security precautions are to be taken by the SAS at Friday's royal wedding to protect the royal family and guests from terrorists.
Eight twenty foot high artificial English maple trees are to be positioned around Westminster Abbey with up to six SAS 'elite marksmen' concealed within the branches of each one. At the bottom of each tree, within each of the hollow trunks, will be an additional SAS man, or woman, who will be required to walk the mobile trees inconspicuously from place to place as the day progresses.
The mobility of the false trees will mean they can be re-located to Buckingham Palace later to form part of the security measures for the reception on Friday evening. The SAS marksmen in the branches have been specially trained to mimic the whistling calls of various birds found within the British Isles and will be dressed accordingly on the day of the royal wedding.
The artificially manned trees were originally intended for use in Afghanistan but that idea was then abandoned when it was realized the moving trees would arouse the suspicions of the enemy given the largely treeless terrain of that country.
A spokesperson for the SAS, who would only call himself 'Tango Zulu Victor 46' explained,
"Unlike Afghanistan there are many genuine maple trees around Westminster abbey. Terrorists would find it very difficult to identify the false trees from the real ones and frankly would only find out when the SAS marksmen perching on the branches open fire on the would-be assassins."
He continued, "We tested one of the trees out along The Mall during last Sunday's London marathon. One of our men managed to walk the tree from one side of the road to the other while thousands of runners were streaming past.Nobody noticed."
