What everyone should know about airport security

By Dallas Pierce
web posted July 29, 2002

What happened on September 11 had nothing to do with airport
security. Federal Aviation Administration regulation did not
prohibit the carriage of box cutters through airport security
checkpoints. Moreover, because the federal government was
(and currently is) so concerned about racial profiling, had
screeners attempted to take action against the individuals or
groups making up the 19 hijackers, as they passed through
security with these legal items, they would have faced criticism
and possible disciplinary action. In the end, their fear of
disciplinary action and potential termination would have
prevented them from taking action, even had they perceived a
threat from these individuals. This has not changed.

What did the government do as a result...they federalized a
portion of airport security in the largest expanse of governmental
authority in history, and they are uncertain as to how or whether
they can complete the task. The former head of the
Transportation Security Administration, John Magaw, asked for
$4.4 billion in supplemental appropriations for fiscal 2002, in
addition to the 2.4 billion the TSA has already been given. Yes,
you read those words correctly..."supplemental" and "2002".
Short of outright chicanery the government cannot meet their
self-imposed December 31st deadline for the screening of all
passenger baggage in the manner in which they've committed
themselves, with or without the supplemental funding. No way,
no how...and the airline industry told them so-both before and
after they made this pronouncement.

The federal government has not shared detailed information
about the travel characteristics of the 19 hijackers with the airline
industry, and by that fact, they have not been incorporated into
any airport/airline security program. That's right...how did these
nineteen people fly? Well, some thing's we know; they were all
Arab; they traveled in teams of 4 or 5, and they all had box
cutters. But what we know is only superficial, what we don't
know is crucial. How did they buy their tickets...did they
purchase them all through a travel agency, on line, or directly
from the airlines? Were they members of the airlines frequent
flyer programs? Were they one-way tickets? Were they
purchased with credit cards or cash? If they were purchased
with a credit card, were they all charged against one credit card
account or were several used? What about the phone contacts
they supplied the booking agent or agents...was the same phone
number in each of the hijacker's reservations? This is no small
matter; airline reservations systems hold billions of customer
reservations that should have been screening for these
characteristics since September 11 and are not.

Why has the government failed to adopt a trusted traveler
program? Because they don't know who can be trusted. The
airlines do, but the federal government is preventing them from
adopting or even testing such a program. This is a matter you
should watch closely. Databases to which the government has
access cannot be easily accessed. Moreover, such databases
will not tell the government what they need to know. None of the
hijackers from September 11 had criminal files and each could
have been in the country legally (Whether they were or not is
irrelevant).

Where does this leave us? Well, it is here you come back to two
elements that neither the government nor the American people
can wrap their heads around: profiling for terrorists and moving
airline security back into the private sector-one the government is
unwilling to do and the other they cannot. It is also here where a
fundamental aspect of international terrorism has been
overlooked. International terrorism of the September 11-type
requires a psychological nurturing that precludes someone from
spending a long amount of time in the U.S. For whatever
psycho-sociological reason, extended periods of time in the U.S.
and a willingness to commit fanatical, suicidal terrorism are
apparently mutually exclusive propositions. The longer Arab
males spend in the U.S. the more entrenched they become in
western custom; the more comfortable they become with their
families, neighbors, employment situation and the less likely they
are to sacrifice their lives for a cause.

Whether an Arab male has a criminal record; is in the country
legally, or when it comes down to it, purchases a round-trip or
one-way airline ticket, may be of little consequence...how long
he's been a member of an airline frequent flyer program and how
frequently he's been flying over time could tell you whether he's a
potential terrorist better than anything. Certainly when such a
membership is associated with other elements of an individual's
travel history with which airlines routinely come in contact and
record (i.e., passport country of issuance, country travel history,
employer, etc.).

Would Arab males residing in the U.S. be precluded from
trusted status? Not at all, Arab males have been working
productively and patriotically in the U.S. for decades and have
earned the respect and trust of their companies and the U.S.
government. The same goes for other Middle Easterners, Indians
and Pakistanis.

The government arguably has a role in airline security; it just may
not have changed as a result of the events of September 11. The
government's move into the domestic airline security business is
another matter altogether. Just because an attack is levied against
Americans on U.S. soil-an act of war-doesn't necessarily follow
that they should take over airline security. President Bush had it
right the first time; airport screeners should have been moved
under government direction-not be made federal employees.
This accomplished nothing. Airlines came under fire by
government officials and others for not requiring a high school
diploma for screening positions. What was the first thing the
government did when they took over this responsibility? ...You
guess it...removed the requirement for a high school diploma.

What all this may mean in the end is little...you're still safer on an
airplane than you are taking your morning shower. If you are
worried about safety there are plenty of other things you can
start looking at...the average person is exposing him or herself to
a range of activities 150 to 4000% more dangerous than
anything they could ever do on an airplane. Let's get real.

The answer at this point is not how do you make the government
security machine run more effectively, it's how do you make it
stop. Examples of government relinquishing massive programs to
the private sector, on the magnitude of what airport security has
now become, are slim and this appears to be what's badly
needed at this point.

In the meantime, the following is short list of indicators that the
government's about to pull another fast one on you:

They will announce that explosive trace-detection technology
(ETD) constitutes the screening of passenger baggage for
explosives. This is not true. The screening of bags with explosive
detection systems (EDS) involves X-raying an entire bag, not
just checking for traces of explosive residue. Or;

They will announce that they've extended the deadline for the
explosives screening of all passenger bags, in direct contrast to
that which was set forth in the Transportation Security Act.

They will realize that they cannot constructively meet their self-
imposed deadline of November 19, 2002 for taking over the
checkpoints with government employees so they will discontinue
the secondary gate screening of passengers they once thought
too important to let the airlines discontinue.

They will announce the testing of a trusted traveler program that
has less to do with recognizing potential terrorists than it will
those who shouldn't have been screened in the first place: airline
and air transport workers, law enforcement and government
employees (yeah politicians!), and so on.

Let's stay tuned.

Dallas Pierce is the pseudonym of an employee of a major
American airline.

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