One thing I think everyone is forgetting is that it may not be necessary to sneak into a building or onto a site. The person(s) could already work there.
*Note: I am not advocating the interrogation, incarceration or any other means of harassing persons of middle eastern descent.
I think it virtually certain that there will be a sequal to the atrocities of Sep 11, and it will have even greater impact. I also think it’s likely there will be a strike somewhere else, such as here in the UK, before the next attack in the USA.
The terrorists still have the option of hijacking planes if they want. All the stories about ‘tightenend security’ are just happy soundbites from the airlines’ PR teams, with every airline desperately trying to stay in business. Read the recent news reports - there are always enough security weak spots to let the terrorists get through. That’s the reality.
However, I’m not sure the terrorists will still be thinking in terms of hijacks, planes, bombs or other traditional attacks. They could well be hatching more subtle plans, such as introducing smallpox into the water supply, or simply devastating the economy by various acts of cyber-terrorism. Think about it - we now live in, and depend on, a world in which 10 million financial transactions a day are essentilaly nothing more than computers exchanging data. Take out a substantial enough chunk of that data, and you can create havoc and panic on a massive scale.
After all, to someone who knows what he’s doing, hacking into the data warehouse of major financial instituions is a far from insurmountable challenge. In fact, given a sufficiently well-organised effort, success would be more or less assured (it just might take a little time).
Imagine that suddenly, overnight, there is no trace of your bank account and no proof that you have any financial assets at all. Imagine just 10,000 people in your state suddenly finding themselves in the same position. If those bank records - which are just 0s and 1s on an electro-magnetic file somewhere - are suddenly obliterated, you suddenly have no way to pay your mortgage or your rent. No way to get cash out of the machine in the wall. No way to pay for food or fuel. But you’ve got last month’s paper statement showing how much you’re worth! Well, take it down to the bank and stand in line with the other 10,000 claimants, assuming the bank hasn’t just gone out of business altogether, and see them ask you to prove you didn’t withdraw the whole amount just the evening before the cyber-terrorists pulled their stunt.
Imagine this situation multiplied across all of the UK or all the USA. Just how fragile is the economy? And if you really, really wanted to strike at the heart of the USA, the ultimate free economy, which would be a more appealing target - smashing another jet into a building, or managing to de-stabilise the economy without even stepping on American soil or setting off a single explosion?
Erasing tall buildings is so difficult. Erasing large strings of 0s and 1s so much easier, and so much more effective.