Have they ever caught anyone trying to smuggle through security a gun, explosive liquid, any sort of implement meant to be used in a malicious manner? And what I mean by that is someone who is trying to sneak through an object for the very purpose of wreaking some kind of havoc, and not just a guy who mistakenly put his pocketknife in his carry-on bag or maybe had a few shotgun shells left over from a hunting trip that he forgot about. Have they ever caught an honest to goodness terrorist?
“Prevented a crime” and “caught a perpetrator” are two different things.
As far as catching someone, it doesn’t seem that there is any evidence that the TSA has caught a terrorist red-handed. Of course, there are frequent cases of various weapons being intercepted before they can make it onboard, including knifes and guns and other stuff. The TSA says that they stop about 2 guns a day from being taken on airplanes.
http://blog.tsa.gov/2010/08/guns-are-no-fun-at-checkpoint.html
But “preventing” is a different matter. How many attacks would have been attempted had it not been for stricter screening after 9/11? I think it is a fairly reasonable conclusion that airport security deters some attacks, in the same sort of way that having police on a street corner deters muggings, even if nobody is arrested.
It’s pretty difficult to say whether a given policy has prevented events from taking place, but if you frame the question a bit differently, you might be able to come up with some good arguments.
“What sorts of feasible attacks has the additional TSA screening made infeasible?”
Looking at it from that perspective, I don’t think it’s done much.
The additional screening for knives and other non-projectile hand-weapons has not reduced the risk of a group of people taking over a plane with them and flying it into a building, because that sort of attack stopped being feasible a few hours into the morning of Sept. 11.
The additional screening for liquids or other types of explosives is harder to quantify. People have made it through security with some explosives, but have not actually managed to cause much harm. In most of those cases (all?) they were stopped by passengers before they were able to detonate anything, which points to an argument like the one against knives. Not an effective attack because the passengers will stop you. On the other hand, you could argue that if screening were more lax, they could have smuggled larger explosives aboard, or better ignition methods, or something.
OP chiming in here. Yeah, I guess that would be a better way to phrase the question. Obviously the TSA’s mere presence has stopped people from trying to smuggle bombs aboard. I guess what I was getting at was has the TSA prevented any terrorist attacks that might have been feasible with pre-9/11 security.
Part of the problem with this is that anyone who is caught with a gun or knife or whatever is going to say that they just mistakenly left it in the bag, or they didn’t know the rules or whatever. Nobody is going to readily admit that they intended to wreak havoc and they’ve been foiled.
Having said that, I think a huge percentage of what the TSA catch probably is the result of honest mistakes. But we’ll probably never know exactly how often, if ever, they have prevented a terrorist attack.
FWIW, the TSA’s current technology probably wouldn’t have even stopped the Christmas underwear bomber (cite).
And Bruce Schneier makes a good point that the underwear bomber actually represents a success for even pre-9/11 security technology, if applied correctly.
Even though he managed to sneak some explosives onto an airplane, the bomber was not able to sneak an effective bomb onboard due to basic pre-9/11 security measures. The cockpit door was reinforced, so any takeover risk was minimal. And the other passengers were alert to potential risks and were able to subdue the bomber.
Our current technology and enhanced patdowns might have been able to root this guy out, but it’s not likely. A combination of pre-9/11 security technology, alert passengers, and a secure cockpit door limited the incident so that the would-be terrorist was the only injured person on the plane.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idICUSiGcqo Our present technology provides a sense of false security.
It’s an unanswerable question.
Say a school adopts a strict new dress code policy: No hats allowed. Students are told that starting Monday, everybody entering the building will be visually checked for hats. All hats found will be confiscated.
Monday comes, and not a single student arrives at school wearing a hat. So, how many hats did the new policy prevent? I don’t know, do you?
Does all this mean that I can get the nail file on my finger nail clippers, my brand new tube of deodorant and my tube of toothpaste back?
Read this
11 firearms a week for 9 years? And *none *of them are potential terrorists?
Doesn’t sound like ‘security theatre’ to me. And personally, I wouldn’t want to bet the life of those air travellers that they were all accidents.
I believe that the question is not whether the TSA catches anything, but rather if it works more efficiently than the system in place before. So, if airport security caught 11 guns a week in the 1990s, the extra stuff seems like a waste.
The trickiness comes in the assumption that as many people were trying to smuggle guns onto planes in both periods. I have no idea if that’s true. We could today be getting a higher or lower percentage than before September 11, even if the actual quantities are roughly the same.
I wonder how many people traveled across country with guns they forgot to claim? Does anyone thing we get them all? Some just carry everywhere.
The problem with that argument is that the incident isn’t going to just end there. Someone caught with a bomb (guns and knives are no longer the real issue now that the paradigm has shifted from “sit tight while the clown gets his soapbox and free ride to Cuba” to “he’s going to kill you anyway, so take him down”) isn’t going to be sent on his way after offering a lame excuse. So, if the TSA is actually any good at providing security, where are the examples of this scenario being played out?
As noted above, there’s no reason to think this represents an improvement resulting from post 9-11 security dinner theater.
And, in fact, anti-personnel weapons are unlikely to be terrorists – they’re evil, not stupid, and they know as well as you and I do that taking over planes to use them as missiles is a trick that only works once.
I agree with this completely. There’s no way to know if there’s more or less attempts since before 9/11.
I’d suggest that there’s less ‘accidental’ carrying incidents (since it’s so much more publicized now) and more ‘attack’ incidents (as anti-US sentiment builds among the jihad crowd).
and the 6 ‘artfully concealed prohibited items’ per week? Surely some of them were probably explosive devices, if we’re talking 6/week over 9 years?
Mr. Smashy - qualifiers from your last two posts, “I suggest” and “surely.”
Sorry, but I find such “evidence” insufficient to warrant the cost and inconvenience of TSA’s efforts - and would desire a stronger justification of ANY government program/expenditure.
But I fear no amount of debate will bridge the gap between you and I. And you should derive comfort from the fact that these days your posture seems to be receiving far more attention than mine.
Whatever one’s opinion, ISTM we all lack sufficient facts upon which to intelligently weigh the costs, risks, and alternatives. Unless one feels the returns never diminish sufficiently to outweigh additional expense/efforts.
If you’re wondering about your inherent rights, and other Constitutional facts
Then repeat to yourself 'It’s just a show" as they probe your anal cracks.
I can’t wait for the day a terrorist tries to smuggle a bomb through security by shoving it up his ass.
The fact that there have been no reported arrests is a good indicator that not one of them was an explosive device, and that all of them were more along the lines of a 4-ounce mouthwash bottle wedged underneath the miscellaneous contents of a carry-on bag.