What might have happened on Sept. 11...

[Trei, Peter]

> Jim Choate[SMTP:ravage at ssz.com] wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 20 Sep 2001, Matthew Gaylor wrote:
> 
> > What might have happened on Sept. 11 if this were truly The Land of the
> Free:
> > 
> > 
> > <http://www.tlknapp.net/bieser091101frames.html>
> > 
> > Go to the above url to view a cartoon created by Scott Bieser, 
> > proprietor of Liberty Artworx <http://www.libertyartworx.com/>.
> 
> Except they'd have had guns too...the plane needs lots of little holes and
> more dead bodies (with shooters hunkered down behind the seats).
> James Choate
> 
Think it through Jim, if  you can.

What would actually happen is that there would not be an attempt
to hijack the plane. The only reason the terrorists pulled it off
on the first three was that the usual protocol for hijacks involves
landing, and letting most/all of the passengers off unharmed.
For disarmed passengers, the best option for survival was to 
anticipate this protocol, and sit tight.

As soon as some of the passengers on plane 4 learned what
a different protocol was in effect, the terrorists were doomed. 

If a hijack was attempted today, even against disarmed passengers
by terrorists with guns there would be, in the words of one recent 
post 'entrails on the windows, even if the passengers were Quaker
schoolgirls".

A plane where there is a chance that a significant fraction of the
passengers are armed (hopefully with frangible, low velocity ammo)
is no longer a soft target, even to terrorists with guns. They best
they can hope to do is crash the plane, without any precise selection
of target.

Peter Trei