Millions of sports lovers are still thinking about one thing----the Winter Olympics in Sochi Russia. Close to 2900 men and women competed in the 2014 Winter Games about a month ago. The Olympics brought a lot of attention to Sochi, a city on the Black Sea, which is a popular area for vacation travelers. The area is known for its mild winters. At least $50 billion was spent on the 2014 Winter Games, making it the costliest Olympics in history. Seven billion dollars was spent on the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver, Canada. Olympic officials chose Sochi to host the 2014 games almost seven years ago. At that time, Russian President Vladimir Putin said the games would cost about $13 billion. Yet the actual expenses exceeded his estimate. So where did all the money go? Some observers say the high cost is partly the result of security measures. Brian Jenkins, a terrorism expert from the RAND Corporation, gave the following explanation. There were anywhere between 70,000 and 100, 000 policemen and military troops deployed around the city. The main threat came from separatist and Islamist groups from the North Caucasus, especially from Chechnya and Dagestan. One group claimed responsibility for two suicide bombings in Volgograd last December. The attacks killed more than 30 people. The city is only about 600 kilometers away from Sochi. Bruce Hoffman is a terrorism expert from Georgetown University in Washington DC. He says the increased security made Sochi a difficult target for terrorists. It is thought that the terrorists' intention was to make life difficult for the Russians and to create some sort of incident that would take away the enjoyment. The last Olympians from around the world on Russian soil were in 1980. That was a year after Soviet troops invaded Afghanistan. More than sixty countries didn't take part in the Moscow Summer Games to show their anger. According to the passage, why did the Sochi Winter Olympics cost so much?
Because it was held at an area popular for vacation travelers. Because the Russian government wanted to make it the best ever held.[:] Because security measures at Sochi were stricter than before. Because the original plan was made 7 years before.