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9/11: why haven't we been attacked again?
r4dr3z
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Registered User regular
Almost 10 years ago, Bin Laden sent 19 of his men on a suicide mission that killed 3,000 Americans and destroyed millions and billions of dollars of American infrastructure and wealth. He then issued video recordings where he swore that the United States is his enemy and wanted to do everything he could to hurt us for our crimes against him and his people.
Since then, America hasn't really been attacked. Bin Laden has access to millions of dollars of wealth and is connected to a global terrorist organization with similar ideals. All the United States has done to protect themselves is come up with a color-coded chart for how dangerous things are and put in place machines that let the security guards see your twig and berries when you go to board a plane. There are plenty of ripe targets throughout the United States. Just 5 suicide bombers setting off bombs in the security lines of 5 of the busiest airports on a Friday would probably kill or injure just as many people as the 19 on 9/11. Such an attack would also result in billions of dollars of financial damage as the airline industry tries to recover.
So why hasn't OBL been successful in orchestrating such an attack? I remember people saying how his organization works in mysterious ways and waits for the right opportunity. Are we just doing that good of a job with our airport security, no-fly lists, and counter-intelligence? Are the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan really depleting their resources? Last I heard, Al Qaeda in Afghanistan is able to continue to mount attacks against US forces there. Surely they could somehow transport 5 suicide bombers and some C4 to US shores. I just can't figure it out...
Since then, America hasn't really been attacked. Bin Laden has access to millions of dollars of wealth and is connected to a global terrorist organization with similar ideals. All the United States has done to protect themselves is come up with a color-coded chart for how dangerous things are and put in place machines that let the security guards see your twig and berries when you go to board a plane. There are plenty of ripe targets throughout the United States. Just 5 suicide bombers setting off bombs in the security lines of 5 of the busiest airports on a Friday would probably kill or injure just as many people as the 19 on 9/11. Such an attack would also result in billions of dollars of financial damage as the airline industry tries to recover.
So why hasn't OBL been successful in orchestrating such an attack? I remember people saying how his organization works in mysterious ways and waits for the right opportunity. Are we just doing that good of a job with our airport security, no-fly lists, and counter-intelligence? Are the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan really depleting their resources? Last I heard, Al Qaeda in Afghanistan is able to continue to mount attacks against US forces there. Surely they could somehow transport 5 suicide bombers and some C4 to US shores. I just can't figure it out...
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However, here in the US this isn't the case. While he may have sympathizers, he has very few people who are willing to die for him and have their familes face the consequences of their actions. People also tend to be wealthier and better educated. If Jimmy dissapears to go to a terrorist training camp in Ohio, someone is likely to report it.
Terrorist attacks are easy and pretty much unavoidable if you can find people willing to die for you. Finding people willing to do that (who are also sane enough to carry out a reasonable plan of attack and not mess up the bombing) is pretty hard in the US, and smuggling someone into the US to carry out such an attack is hard because the people you have don't blend in in the US.
There was a study a while back that did psych profiles of suicide bombers and the 9/11 guys and found that most of them were highly suicidal (duh). That makes them prime candidates for manipulation for a Death By Cop on a grand scale.
Ah yes, here's the article.
Actually, if somebody was absolutely determined to carry out another terrorist attack on the US, they would do it and there wouldn't be a whole lot we could do to stop them, given enough funding and training. Fortunately, as tbloxham pointed out, there aren't many of those people here and we're pretty good at keeping them out.
It's like the Filibuster in the last session; you don't actually need to do it to screw with the other guys, the threat of it alone is enough to keep them dancing about.
Part of it is that terrorists are complete idiots, too. Planes and major buildings in population centers are very well secured but much of our infrastructure and most public places are completely vulernable. Hell, 2 dudes with a rifle and a crappy car sent DC into a virtual panic - if they had any sense, they could actually impact the lives of many individuals, possibly even on a mass scale.
We're still frightened out of our wits in this country, or we wouldn't have things like the Patriot Act and warning levels and fearmongering on the news etc. etc. etc.
They may as well save their resources until we've gotten over it before they risk attacking us on our home soil again.
Yet.
Of course, I don't know if that technology exists, so I'm likely just talking out of my ass here.
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Pretty much. The terrorists were incredibly lucky. Plus, when anti-terrorism efforts work, the public never hears about it. As a CIA analyst told me, their jobs are similar to that of a referee. You only make news when you screw up.
Bin Laden was as surprised as we were when the towers fell. It was a black swan.
Additionally, they got lucky with 9/11 as it was.
The whole plan was just to crash planes into WTC.
Both buildings collapsing was completely unplanned.
I also recall reading something about how Al Qaida was completely unprepared for the speed and magnitude with which USA reacted. They were expecting analysis paralysis and indecision.
IT WAS ALL A CONSPIRACY!!!!
>_>
Yup. They didn't expect to succeed in hijacking multiple planes; that was redundancy. There were dozens of attempted attacks in the years before 9/11 and all failed. That's why al Qaeda relied on sheer probability. If you try enough attacks, one will work by sheer dumb luck.
You can't just set up a radio and override a broadcast unless your only goal was to annoy the neighbor in the apartment next to yours.
"Martha! Ahmed next door's replacing our Seinfeld reruns with islamic propaganda again!"
All the stories I've read of terrorists indicate to me that either a) they don't actually want to die all that much, and delay any action forever and just talk, and b) they're pretty damn stupid.
That's also a big factor: up until 9/11, "plane hijacking" was synonymous with "fly us to Cuba and we'll negotiate a hostage release." That was the mindset, so the passengers cooperated so they could land safely.
If someone pulls a box cutter on a plane post-9/11, I'd expect him to get torn limb from limb by the passengers.
These days? A fair bit considering you can no longer get into the pilot's cabin with just a knife.
Someone needs to post the "Soul Plane 2" trailer, as it showed exactly that.
Yes that man!
Pretty obvious to people with eyes open
Ummm, I think you will find if you look at your history, the americans sold arms to Bin laden to fight off the ruskys.
The USA and Bin laden were friends in the 80's
Anyone on these forums is aware that we paid the startup costs for most of our enemies. That doesn't answer my question.
I imagine today this would be an even more common response to a hijacking of a plane with no air marshal aboard.
30 years would put that in 1971, which was before the Soviets in Afghanistan, so no.
He was pissed when the Saudis turned down his offer to protect Saudi Arabia against Iraq following Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, and that the Saudis instead chose to let American troops in. That's the big beef between him and the US, that "infidels" were (still are, actually) occupying the land of Mecca and Medina.
This is what I was thinking of.
It's always sad to remember that for me - they fought back and the plane still went down.
It was preferable to the alternative of the image of the center of power in the country in flames making it a tiny bit easier to find smarter angry youths to carry out more successful attacks.
Thinking about it that way makes it easier to handle.
Fixed. Saving lives is the icing and hard candy letters.
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There's no real reason for al Qaeda to actually do another successful attack. They have the infamy and recognition from the first one. They already run it like a Franchise There was no al-Qaeda in Iraq before the US response to 9/11.
Ted Koppel's view on it.
I don't think people are seriously planning an attack like that because they don't need to in order to invoke the same response. Why spend all that time and planning on real terrorism when you can just send a suicidal teenage with explosives packed in his underwear to get caught and scare people?
Terrorists will keep trying to smuggle bombs onto planes, but they don't really have the ability to take over a plane and use it as a missile anymore.
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