It has always been about balance.
No bottomless pit of money, ideas but only so far as the money allows.
When the Met got their Bell 222's in 1980 there were well founded fears about [Irish] terrorism and there were brill ideas about double fences and CCTV every 10 yards at Lippitts Hill. The 'short term' answer was a pair of cops a six-gun and a dog. Problem was when the cop with the gun drew it the dog would take his hand off....
That did not work and was expensive so they found some another way of doing it with just the single fence.
The same with Surrey. More than a decade ago you could see that the site was vulnerable.... piece of cake to attack .... but this was England and although there were precedents in rough parts of the UK it did not happen in Surrey...
Well it did not happen for more than a decade and its clear now the disgusting 'walk backwards' ethos* of modern policing has allowed this to creep up and bite Surrey twice.
So, now ten years of cheapness on, they need to do something and I guess its build a giant wall or moat. From other pages of the Telegraph it is clear that there are certain MP's who have information on moats and how to keep them clean at taxpayers expense.
The alternative is to run*.
Overall it proves one thing very clearly to those denigrating air support across this forum.
Those violent 'gentlemen' in Surrey had a very firm belief in the power of air support and wished to remove it.
Despite the cost of this event I think it actually underlines its value as an asset a great deal.