At this early stage, in which information we have is relatively
limited, it’s important to use caution when commenting on the
attempted terrorist attack outside of Detroit on Christmas Day,
but there are a few issues that the incident does raise.
One question is whether we should be more scared of Al Qaeda
(assuming they are somehow linked to the attack) or less scared
because the attack was bungled in a fashion worthy of a slapstick
comedy? In some circles, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab quickly became
known as the “crotch
bomber.”
My early reaction is that, yes, the bomber was unable to pull it
off and elements of the story lend themselves to mockery. But, at
the same time it does show that terrorists are still intent on
attacking America and they are constantly concocting ways to find
holes in our security measures and testing new methods.
The idea of smuggling in a bunch of explosive materials into a
plane, assembling a bomb aboard, and blowing it up in a seat of
the plane where it could set off a chain of events that would
bring down the whole plane, is nothing new. Just read this
Washington Post
story dated July 21, 1996, titled, “New Devices May Foil
Airline Security,” which describes a nearly identical scenario.
Ramzi Yousef, one of the planners of the first World Trade Center
bombing and nephew of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed,
made a similar attempt onboard Philippine
Airlines Flight 434, which was supposed to be a test for a
larger attack on more planes. So a botched attempt this Christmas
doesn’t mean that terrorists won’t be able to figure out
something that works at some point down the road.
While people have differerent perspectives on how concerned we
should be about this attempted attack — and how big a threat
terrorism is in general — most people seem to be in agreement
that the subsequent security measures
imposed by the TSA are idiodic. This would be a good time to
reevaluate how we think about airline security — and perhaps
discuss emulating the Israeli model. Israel, rather than relying
on these silly rules, turns to observation and human
intellegence. Security workers ask a number of questions to
passengers, and they are trained to pick up on anything
suspicious. They also don’t take anything for granted, because
they assume that anybody could be a potential security threat. In
my personal experience, there have been times traveling to Israel
when I glided through security rather easily, and other times
when I’ve been questioned extensively by two different security
workers. I’d much rather that sort of system than our reactive
approach in which one person tries to set off a bomb in his shoe,
and so then we have to take off our shoes. Then somebody puts a
bomb in his pants, but since we can’t have people take off their
underwear, we have to make arbitrary rules about when you can go
to the bathroom during an international flight.
