OT: Counter-Terrorism is a Farce

[Renegade 13]

It seems that every time I turn on the news or the radio, people are freaking out due to terrorism threats. Oooh, someone might use liquids to blow up a plane! Oh no, Hezbollah is evil! Etc, etc, ad nauseum. No one seems to understand that extra "security measures" simply play into the hands of these terrorists. Why, you ask? The simple, economical cost of all these security measures costs billions per year. Any idiot knows that if you're trying to hurt a country, you don't try to kill a few thousand of its citizens; that's ineffecient. No, you figure out a way to cost the country billions of dollars. Now that will hurt the country long term! So what's the solution?

Here's my simple solution to the problem:

Get rid of all additional security measures that have been put in since 2001. They're pointless, and they cost a hell of a lot. Don't worry about stopping terrorists.

All you have to do, is when some terrorists go and hijack a plane and plan to go crash it into a building, shoot it down. Fire off a SAM at the aircraft, it'll go down. Its not like it has any electronic countermeasures like modern fighters. No damage to anything except the plane and the people on it. Yes, the people on the plane will die. However, the response to the hijackings is what will ultimately stop these attacks.

Every time some terrorist goes and hijacks a plane and you're forced to blow it out of the sky, you first figure out where the terrorists came from, their home cities. This may take a little bit, but once you figure it out, you destroy one of those cities. Absolutely wipe it off the surface of the Earth. Every time some more terrorists hijack a plane, or blow up a subway system, etc, you wipe out another city. I bet that within 6 months, you won't ever have to worry about terrorist attacks again. After half a dozen of your own planes are shot down by your own missiles, and half a dozen cities are destroyed, no more terrorist attacks will occur.

Now, this may seem heartless and cold-blooded. It probably is. But it'll work. It would probably save more domestic lives in the long term, and will cost a lot less in the long term as well. What do you guys think; would it work and is it practical. What are your solutions to the terrorist problems (which are, admittedly, blown out of all proportion by the media)?

[Jack Simth]

You also lose whatever the plane happens to crash into, of course (commonly a field, forest, or suburb).

a) It would work on one front for a little while. Yes, you would cut down on terrorist attacks, until they started basing themselves elsewhere. You know, fairly populus areas, under the "control" of people that can't do much about the area, surrounded by lots and lots of civilians. Sure, you could still try it... but that just makes (b) much worse:
b) You're going to anger a LOT of people doing this. Seriously. A LOT. Entire countries, along with their militaries. You're wiping out an entire city to get at... what, one or two hundred people? Who will probably catch on, and move between when they train up the person on the suicide mission and when that person actually goes on the suicide mission. You will have 0 sympathy after the first such strike you make.

My advice? Arm the populace. Entirely. Every man and woman old enough to be drafted (assuming, of course, that women could be drafted). Train everyone in the proper use of firearms (including storeage; distribute lock-boxes and proper belts/holsters as well), and encourage them to be carried everywhere (including airplanes). Stress the reason for this (strangely, it doesn't evem need to be true, as long as the untrustworthy can be convinced of it.....): Most citizens are trustworthy about anything important; it is every citizens' duty to help defend the country when the need arises, and every citizens' right to defend themselves against illegal lethal threats. Tell me, how do you hijack a plane by force when you're outnumbered a hundred to one by people who know that your victory means not only their deaths, but the deaths of hundreds of others, and everyone's armed?

[PvK]

The "war on terrorism" is an excuse to create a security industry, further dominate the US public, and other political reasons.

Attacks like plane hijacking can be countered just as effectively without the Patriot Act, Homeland Security, color-coded alert levels, or goofball airport security.

Anti-aircraft measures is another possible idea that could help against a 9/11 attack, but won't help the planes much. Cockpits could be made more secure though. More intelligent and less obtrusive airport security could also help (have smart well-trained people rather than rent-a-guards with silly searches that include grandmothers and everyone's shoes and liquids...).

Wiping out entire foreign towns because a "terrorist" came from it would just make the USA into a far more blatantly detestable empire than it already is, even more than suicide bombers who target civilians, and would be less effective at making the nation safe, because then more civilized sane people would want to destroy the USA too.

Guns on airliners doesn't seem like a great idea, since using them would tend to damage the plane, and make it easier for anyone to cause chaos in the air. Maybe give all passengers access to a spray gun that shoots immobilizing security foam, instead.

PvK

[Renegade 13]

Not to mention sudden depressurization of the passenger cabin when someone starts shooting. Might have some problems there, but other than that, go for it.

[Artaud]

PvK said:
The "war on terrorism" is an excuse to create a security industry, further dominate the US public, and other political reasons.
PvK

^^^^
What he said.


Or, as I like to put it, the goal of the "war on terror" is to keep the "war on terror" going.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Tazers. The ones where the electrodes shoot out.

Doesn't damage the plane and probably still lethal from sheer numbers.

'Kill them all' is a terrorist threat.

[Atrocities]

Oh come on we all know that Terrorism is just something that someone made up in order to sell T-shirts!

Seriously I agree with the nuts that they know where Bin Laden is but won't go get him because that would erode any and all political necessity for continuing the "war on terror."

That they knew where Sarcowie (sp) was all along but waited until the need was great enough politically, to kill that fat bastard extremist.

It takes a well funded and semi well trained group of fanaticial terrorists to take over a plane and I seriously doubt that Grandma and her sun tan lotion is part of the master plan.

[Jack Simth]

Once you have the fanatical terrorist, it actually doesn't cost as much as you might think.

You need:
One computer capable of running a flight simulator.
One flight simulator program.
Enough plane tickets to get your crew aboard the plane.
Enough weapons to arm your crew.

The planes used in the 9/11/01 attacks flew low so they could FOLLOW THE FREEWAYS! Landing and taking off is the difficult part. Not the flying (many airlines actually have a computer do most the in-flight flying anymore, excepting some things from the air traffic controllers about specific routes due to other planes and the like). The hijackers didn't have to deal with either landing or taking off, nor pre-flight checklists, nor dealing with air-traffic control, or.....

[Phoenix-D]

Right now you also need:

One way to convince the passengers not to kill your ***.

or you get one crashed plane and nothing else. 200v5, 200 wins unless the 5 manage to sneak something really nasty past security.

[Yimboli]

do like the romans did - show up, kill all the men, enslave the women and children, and sow the fields with salt.

you didn't see anyone crashing planes into the parthenon did you???