OK, what the hell has happened to the Brits?

So what? You never did explain how the terrorists identify the
marshals.

Lol - they train for the job!

Steven P. McNicoll wrote:


"Andrew Gideon" wrote in message
online.com...

Sigh In you pop up this thread a few messages, you'll see that I wrote:

Yes. They'd also need to identify the marshal amongst the passengers, as
you noted. However, relying upon these "secrets" is relying upon
something
called "security through obscurity". It doesn't work in the long term.


So what? You never did explain how the terrorists identify the marshals.

Yes, I did. I provided a few common examples of how a secret can be exposed
which would work in this case. I also pointed out that my ability to
explain this has no bearing on whether or not they can do this.

You can ask questions about what I've written, or even disagree. But you
look silly claiming I never wrote it.



If nothing else, it's yet another "weak point" against which an "attack"
can
be attempted. It means that the terrorist doesn't need to get a weapon
on board, but just get access to the marshal's identity on a flight.


But how does the terrorist get access to the marshal's identity on a
flight? It's not enough to just state that's all he has to do, you have to
explain how he does it.

I don't have to do this any more than I have to explain how a weapon would
be smuggled on board. The TSA doesn't wait for someone to demonstrate that
it is possible. They assume it is possible, and try to counter that
failure mode.

[Well...in fact I don't think the TSA is actually working this well. The
above is what they should do. It occurs to me to wonder why the TSA is run
by a politician as opposed to (for example) an intelligence specialist (or
some other person with a security background).]

Knowing the details of how a layer will fail is remarkably unimportant when
determining how to deal with that failure.




That is,
there are now two different ways to acquire a weapon on board, whereas
before there was just one.


How does the terrorist get the gun from the marshal?

Exactly as I described before, or in some other way.



So you're depending upon the terrorists not learning a secret.


How would they learn it?

Exactly as secrets are always broken, or in some other way.


That's fine...until/unless they do learn the secret.


How would they learn it?

You sound remarkably like a toddler.


In that
case, security is actually *reduced* as they now have access to
a weapon on board (assuming, again, that it's not easier to simply
smuggle something on board than it is to discern this secret).


But if they don't know who the marshal is security is *increased*.

As long as the secret is safe, you're right. Nobody would ever assume so,
however, any more than they'd assume no weapon could be smuggled on board.
Instead, they assume that the secret will be broken, and create yet another
layer.

- Andrew

In article t, Steven P.
McNicoll wrote:
So you're depending upon the terrorists not learning a secret.

How would they learn it?

There are dozens of ways. It's sort of like solving an equation - from
the knowns you can derive the value of x. The IRA (nothing to do with
pensions, but republican terrorists in Northern Ireland used to spy
quite frequently to find the identity of their enemies and kill them),
and the IRA weren't on suicide missions. Someone determined enough to
face the certainty of death will probably be even more determined.

A brute-force way of doing it would be to have two terrorist cells on
board. The first one begins the hijack. The sky marshall takes charge
and does his job *instantly identifying himself and where he keeps his
gun* to the second cell. The second cell then swing into action some
time later, first seizing control of the sky marshal and his weapon, and
then continuing with their plan. And now they are armed with a gun.

Since flight attendants are allowed on the flight deck, where there is a
crash axe available, what security vetting are we doing of flight
attendants? What does the sky marshal do when an FA incapacitates the
crew with a crash axe and locks the reinforced cockpit door behind him?

--
Dylan Smith, Castletown, Isle of Man
Flying: http://www.dylansmith.net
Frontier Elite Universe: http://www.alioth.net
"Maintain thine airspeed, lest the ground come up and smite thee"

"Dylan Smith" wrote

There are dozens of ways. It's sort of like solving an equation
--
Dylan Smith, Castletown, Isle of Man

The bottom line is, no terrorist will ever again take over a passenger
flight. The crowd will overcome them, or crash the plane, well short of its
objective.
--
Jim in NC

On Thu, 01 Jan 2004 18:49:52 -0000, Dylan Smith
wrote:

A brute-force way of doing it would be to have two terrorist cells on
board. The first one begins the hijack. The sky marshall takes charge
and does his job *instantly identifying himself and where he keeps his
gun* to the second cell. The second cell then swing into action some
time later, first seizing control of the sky marshal and his weapon, and
then continuing with their plan. And now they are armed with a gun.

The good news is, the folks in charge of the US FAMs are way ahead of
you and I. This contingency has already been planned and trained,
along with a few hundred other scenarios we can't even imagine.

-J

Jack Davis
B-737


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On 31 Dec 2003 21:07:01 GMT, Wdtabor wrote:


Uh, there are between 90 and 400 passengers on that plane. How do your two
terrorists know which one to grab, or that there aren't two of them? The
penalty for guessing wrong is death.

on the long run it will let the terrorists succeed. More "security" will be
established to the point where nobody trusts nobody else. Don't you see
that _you_ made them win the game already?

#m

--
harsh regulations in North Korea (read below link after reading the story):
http://www.laweekly.com/ink/04/04/open-mikulan.php
oooops ... sorry ... it happened in the USA, ya know: the land of the free.

"Wdtabor" wrote in message
...

Picture two terrorists, one walking to the restroom and one walking back
from. They meet where the marshal is seated. One grabs the guy around
the
throat while the other goes for the weapon.

Uh, there are between 90 and 400 passengers on that plane. How do your two
terrorists know which one to grab, or that there aren't two of them? The
penalty for guessing wrong is death.

Just playing Devil's wotsit here, "the penalty for guessing wrong is death".
Right. So. They grab someone randomly. The air marshal draws his gun
for issuing said penalty. He's identified. The other 3 terrorists then get
the gun off the air marshal.

I don't have an opinion on this, just thought I'd throw that in! In reality
I
would guess that the air marshal wouldn't draw his weapon if the attackers
were unarmed, and the penalty wouldn't be death.

Paul

"Paul Sengupta" wrote in message
...

Just playing Devil's wotsit here, "the penalty for guessing wrong is
death".
Right. So. They grab someone randomly. The air marshal draws his gun
for issuing said penalty. He's identified. The other 3 terrorists then get
the gun off the air marshal.


How simple. Just take the marshal's gun away from him. Tell me, given that
the marshal has already drawn his gun, how do the other 3 terrorists get his
gun without getting shot in the process?

Paul Sengupta wrote:

Just playing Devil's wotsit here, "the penalty for guessing wrong is death".
Right. So. They grab someone randomly. The air marshal draws his gun
for issuing said penalty. He's identified. The other 3 terrorists then get
the gun off the air marshal.

And while they're trying to do that, the second air marshall shoots all three of
them.

George Patterson
Great discoveries are not announced with "Eureka!". What's usually said is
"Hummmmm... That's interesting...."

"G.R. Patterson III" wrote in message
...

And while they're trying to do that, the second air marshall shoots all
three of
them.


What prevents the first air marshal from shooting them?