One could make the counter argument that some terrorists are discouraged by the difficulty and no longer try. For example, how many plane bombings have their been since Lockerbie? None. Does that mean that we should stop inspecting luggage? Probably not.
> One could make the counter argument that some terrorists are discouraged by the difficulty and no longer try.
Well, let me know if you actually get around to making the argument. In the meantime, consider the basic economics of an attack as laid out by someone else: If the other passengers on the flight realise that you're up to something, every single one of them has a clear motive to take you on in the fight to the death. Hi-jacking a plane has gotten orders of magnitude more difficult after 9/11.
> For example, how many plane bombings have their been since Lockerbie? None. Does that mean that we should stop inspecting luggage? Probably not.
Good thing, then, that the suggestion on the table is a return to pre-9/11 security, not abolishing it.
EDIT: pre-9/11 security, plus the few things we've realised actually makes sense - such as reinforced, locking cockpit doors.
Blowing up a plane by embedding a bomb in a body cavity is still plenty easy post 9/11. The terrorist need only head into the restroom and detonate the bomb under the cover of privacy. Bomb making technology and the willingness to be martyred in a plane attack have increased since 9/11. This is the type of attack that full body scanners attempt to prevent.
> Hi-jacking a plane has gotten orders of magnitude more difficult after 9/11.
Yes. It's important to remember that pre-9/11, the standard expectation was that in a hijacking, passengers would be hostages, not victims. As such, people were specifically instructed not to intervene. That's clearly out the window now.
I find it more likely that terrorists don't think it's worth doing in the first place, security or no. Killing a few dozen people in mid-air might startle a bunch of people on the ground and ground a few flights for a while, but it doesn't actually accomplish anything. The only people that would actually do that are mentally-unbalanced, suicidal people who are just trying to kill themselves in the most spectacular way they can; i.e., not a terrorist.
I think "terrorists" of the "trying to kill us all" variety are trying to bring forward some kind of message or dispense some kind of "justice" under their belief system. To achieve any of that with violence requires there to be an intense, sustained effect on the public and a way to link it back to their concept of justice. The 9/11 attacks accomplished that, but the shoe bomber and underwear bombers wouldn't have if they had succeeded. Their explosive charges were too small and too incompetently assembled to cause the kind of mass panic that "terrorists" are after.
Instead, we have a different breed of terrorists: the "keeping you scared because it benefits them directly" terrorists. The TSA and Homeland Security. The true terrorists in this plot. Keeping people afraid of some vague, non-specific threat because it profits them and those they support.
