Light aircraft "could be bombs"
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Qwertplop
>I cannot understand why it's so hard for people to get their head around the notion of potential because that's all that has been identified. No-one has addressed my points about the other aspects of this issue, the potential to traffick individuals to do harm (any harm), the potential to engage in logistical flights in support of something dastardly, recon, delivery systems, et al.
I suspect anyone working against them is simply engaging in a futile struggle that will not carry one iota of public support. Your last point about documentation is interesting however, scrutiny and credibility based questioning is the key to dealing with such issues yet everyone says here that more scrutiny is not needed. All law enforcement investigative questioning techniques are based around the notion of credibility. So, immediately, we are in conflict with conventional investigative techniques.<
Potential ? There is a mass of potential everywhere you look "serious threat" is a word that is more appropriate.
I have met many MPs in my time and infact most have one gift and that is the gift of the gab and little else.
There are some very intelligent, very dedicated MPs who are nobodies fool and who research their subject thoroughly and without bias or agenda but there are also many who have their own agendas and regrefully there are some who are influenced by minority pressure groups and the votes they get in the ballot box.
This latest attack on aviation needs to be killed in in tracks as a waste of public money and time. There are far greater "potential threats to the safety of the public from terrorism than GA aircraft.
Please do take the London tube in the rush hour and you will see a massive potential to cause as much damage as 9/11 or Lockerbie and ZERO security to stop it happening.
That is where public money needs to be targeted at not some hair brained further targetting of aviation.
And yes AOPA needs to put this idea to bed as it has on other equally poorly thought out schemes against aviation.
Pace
>I cannot understand why it's so hard for people to get their head around the notion of potential because that's all that has been identified. No-one has addressed my points about the other aspects of this issue, the potential to traffick individuals to do harm (any harm), the potential to engage in logistical flights in support of something dastardly, recon, delivery systems, et al.
I suspect anyone working against them is simply engaging in a futile struggle that will not carry one iota of public support. Your last point about documentation is interesting however, scrutiny and credibility based questioning is the key to dealing with such issues yet everyone says here that more scrutiny is not needed. All law enforcement investigative questioning techniques are based around the notion of credibility. So, immediately, we are in conflict with conventional investigative techniques.<
Potential ? There is a mass of potential everywhere you look "serious threat" is a word that is more appropriate.
I have met many MPs in my time and infact most have one gift and that is the gift of the gab and little else.
There are some very intelligent, very dedicated MPs who are nobodies fool and who research their subject thoroughly and without bias or agenda but there are also many who have their own agendas and regrefully there are some who are influenced by minority pressure groups and the votes they get in the ballot box.
This latest attack on aviation needs to be killed in in tracks as a waste of public money and time. There are far greater "potential threats to the safety of the public from terrorism than GA aircraft.
Please do take the London tube in the rush hour and you will see a massive potential to cause as much damage as 9/11 or Lockerbie and ZERO security to stop it happening.
That is where public money needs to be targeted at not some hair brained further targetting of aviation.
And yes AOPA needs to put this idea to bed as it has on other equally poorly thought out schemes against aviation.
Pace
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Originally Posted by qwertyplop
It's also why the charter and air taxi market is booming.
Pace. I find myself largely agreeing with you. My worry isn't the clever, diligent and honest MPs but the hordes of division lobby fodder in the Commons. I also think some influential elements of the Police will latch on firmly to this. As I mentally noted back in '72 (Srl 29), unknown and "unregulated" traffic zipping around outside controlled airspace clearly jarred in the plod mind.
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Originally Posted by qwertyplop
It's also why the charter and air taxi market is booming.
qwertyplop. Sorry but I couldn't resist noting the irony in that. I dread growing up.
Sorry, not my comment. I cut and pasted it to respond.
Potential ? There is a mass of potential everywhere you look "serious threat" is a word that is more appropriate.
Semantics Sir. I agree with the thrust of the point though.
It's also why the charter and air taxi market is booming.
qwertyplop. Sorry but I couldn't resist noting the irony in that. I dread growing up.
Sorry, not my comment. I cut and pasted it to respond.
Potential ? There is a mass of potential everywhere you look "serious threat" is a word that is more appropriate.
Semantics Sir. I agree with the thrust of the point though.
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Check out today's Daily Mail - pages 16/17. The beaurocratic party may now begin and the "free" world may now become less so, I susect. Who is winning this "war"? Stop addressing the symptoms and REALLY go at the cause, otherwise we will end up about as "free" as the average citizen in an extremist Islamic state.
Cut & Paste Intellectual
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Could it be that Lord Carlile has read an advance copy Tom Cain's new book called The Survivor and over reacted? God help us if he reads The Hunt for Red October.
Anyway The Survivor is going to be on my holiday reading list.
Anyway The Survivor is going to be on my holiday reading list.
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Times gone by
a short excerpt form a post I made on another forum that may (or may not) be of some interest -
Could you imagine doing this flight now?
29th November 1983 (for those who do not know, at the height of the cold war) on a leg from Compton Abbas to Leavesden (now sadly like so many other airfields in my book either closed, inaccessible or too bloody expensive to even contemplate landing at) which was 8 miles due East of Bovingdon VOR.
If you draw that route on the current South of England map via the BNN VOR you will see that this would take you just to the south of Newbury racecourse. Put that track into GoogleEarth and you will see that it takes you right over the top of a very large disused airfield that even the younger pilots amongst us would (or should recognise the name of) Greenham Common. At that time of course home to the Women’s Peace Camp and more importantly an untold number of nuclear Cruise Missiles, and although we overflew, we didn’t even speak to them, (probably) we were in contact with London Information but we just overflew above the ATZ and not a problem.
Even when our country and indeed the whole world was subjected to perhaps even greater threats than those we face now, common (no pun intended) sense rather than paranoia prevailed. Lord Carlisle please take note you also must remember when we lived in a free country and the defence of those freedoms was not dependent upon the ever encroaching power of and surveillance by the state and the inevitable and subsequent curtailment of our liberty. (Rant now over)
ZM
Could you imagine doing this flight now?
29th November 1983 (for those who do not know, at the height of the cold war) on a leg from Compton Abbas to Leavesden (now sadly like so many other airfields in my book either closed, inaccessible or too bloody expensive to even contemplate landing at) which was 8 miles due East of Bovingdon VOR.
If you draw that route on the current South of England map via the BNN VOR you will see that this would take you just to the south of Newbury racecourse. Put that track into GoogleEarth and you will see that it takes you right over the top of a very large disused airfield that even the younger pilots amongst us would (or should recognise the name of) Greenham Common. At that time of course home to the Women’s Peace Camp and more importantly an untold number of nuclear Cruise Missiles, and although we overflew, we didn’t even speak to them, (probably) we were in contact with London Information but we just overflew above the ATZ and not a problem.
Even when our country and indeed the whole world was subjected to perhaps even greater threats than those we face now, common (no pun intended) sense rather than paranoia prevailed. Lord Carlisle please take note you also must remember when we lived in a free country and the defence of those freedoms was not dependent upon the ever encroaching power of and surveillance by the state and the inevitable and subsequent curtailment of our liberty. (Rant now over)
ZM
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Last edited by qwertyplop; 29th Jun 2008 at 10:53. Reason: Spelling...........
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G-EMMA Wrote:
I hope you realise from this Carlile is trying very hard to clutch at straws and will therefore review your comments on this thread regard the potential of GA aircraft being used by terrorists.
No Sir, I do not see a need to review of my comments. I simply accept a need for oversight, for whatever reason, by the authorities if they deem to have identified a risk. I am happy to to at least debate the issue in an open forum and give an opinion, I cannot offer anything more than that really.
And here's something to consider, if you used any of the things you identified in a suspcious manner, in a public place, and were pinged for doing something that might lead to a view that you were up to no good, you'd be stopped and questioned. That's the bigger issue here G-EMMA and that's the issue that should be debated. If you were on the tube and were spotted concealing a battery pack inside a coke can or a bag of crisps, I expect someone would raise the alarm. And rightly so IMO because it's the environment that's the issue in addition to the act itself, the act of doing that in such an environment is open to question. GA is different because of the control one has over where one can be with the minimum of oversight. It strikes me as a bigger issue than the aircraft itself. It's a combination of things.
But then, playing devils advocate, should a photography student standing outside a tube station taking photos be stopped and searched? And so and so forth.
The cat's out of the bag now and that's the issue. How both sides of the debate deals with this issue in the future when such mindsets exist is the problem GA and the authorities have now.
I still accept the need for oversight however but that's just me, that said, I am very open to the opinions discrediting oversight and the choice of GA as a topic for such oversight.
Best,
QP
I hope you realise from this Carlile is trying very hard to clutch at straws and will therefore review your comments on this thread regard the potential of GA aircraft being used by terrorists.
No Sir, I do not see a need to review of my comments. I simply accept a need for oversight, for whatever reason, by the authorities if they deem to have identified a risk. I am happy to to at least debate the issue in an open forum and give an opinion, I cannot offer anything more than that really.
And here's something to consider, if you used any of the things you identified in a suspcious manner, in a public place, and were pinged for doing something that might lead to a view that you were up to no good, you'd be stopped and questioned. That's the bigger issue here G-EMMA and that's the issue that should be debated. If you were on the tube and were spotted concealing a battery pack inside a coke can or a bag of crisps, I expect someone would raise the alarm. And rightly so IMO because it's the environment that's the issue in addition to the act itself, the act of doing that in such an environment is open to question. GA is different because of the control one has over where one can be with the minimum of oversight. It strikes me as a bigger issue than the aircraft itself. It's a combination of things.
But then, playing devils advocate, should a photography student standing outside a tube station taking photos be stopped and searched? And so and so forth.
The cat's out of the bag now and that's the issue. How both sides of the debate deals with this issue in the future when such mindsets exist is the problem GA and the authorities have now.
I still accept the need for oversight however but that's just me, that said, I am very open to the opinions discrediting oversight and the choice of GA as a topic for such oversight.
Best,
QP
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Stop for a moment and try to imagine a society where all "possible" terrorist threats are neutralised!
God help us if the likes of Lord whatshisface and QP here get their way. I assume they are both old enough to not have to live too long with the consequences. Some of us will though, and my children even longer.
Big Brother Nanny State has you by the bo!!ocks (not you G-EMMA, obviously!)
God help us if the likes of Lord whatshisface and QP here get their way. I assume they are both old enough to not have to live too long with the consequences. Some of us will though, and my children even longer.
Big Brother Nanny State has you by the bo!!ocks (not you G-EMMA, obviously!)
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Sorry G-EMMA. 
How have you, Squeegee Longtail, come to the conclusion that I am the worst thing for society that has ever existed? What a total overreaction.
All I've said is that monitoring is clearly an issue for the powers that be and that I subscribe to monitoring if it's considered appropriate. Additionally, I also said that there is little I don't disagree with on the other side of the argument but that I'm open to a debate, with the authorities, on this idea. And I'm open because it seems to me that to participate in a debate before something is done is better than all the usual hangwringing after. I also said that there is a threat, and that the threat needs to be assessed and dealt with by the powers that be. It's what they are paid to do and I guess they are doing it.
No-one has answered any point I've made about self regulation and self policing. No-one dealt with logisitics, recce's et al - everyone has seemed to focus on the aircraft being used on a one way trip. All I've heard in response is that you can use a car and a can of coke if you like and that it's a waste of time.
Fine but a least explain why?
Nowhere have I advocated signing away any of my perceived freedoms or liberties. To suggest such a thing is, frankly, offensive.
How have you, Squeegee Longtail, come to the conclusion that I am the worst thing for society that has ever existed? What a total overreaction.
All I've said is that monitoring is clearly an issue for the powers that be and that I subscribe to monitoring if it's considered appropriate. Additionally, I also said that there is little I don't disagree with on the other side of the argument but that I'm open to a debate, with the authorities, on this idea. And I'm open because it seems to me that to participate in a debate before something is done is better than all the usual hangwringing after. I also said that there is a threat, and that the threat needs to be assessed and dealt with by the powers that be. It's what they are paid to do and I guess they are doing it.
No-one has answered any point I've made about self regulation and self policing. No-one dealt with logisitics, recce's et al - everyone has seemed to focus on the aircraft being used on a one way trip. All I've heard in response is that you can use a car and a can of coke if you like and that it's a waste of time.
Fine but a least explain why?
Nowhere have I advocated signing away any of my perceived freedoms or liberties. To suggest such a thing is, frankly, offensive.
Last edited by qwertyplop; 29th Jun 2008 at 16:50.
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Qwertplop
>And here's something to consider, if you used any of the things you identified in a suspcious manner, in a public place, and were pinged for doing something that might lead to a view that you were up to no good, you'd be stopped and questioned. That's the bigger issue here G-EMMA and that's the issue that should be debated. If you were on the tube and were spotted concealing a battery pack inside a coke can or a bag of crisps, I expect someone would raise the alarm. And rightly so IMO because it's the environment that's the issue in addition to the act itself, the act of doing that in such an environment is open to question. GA is different because of the control one has over where one can be with the minimum of oversight. It strikes me as a bigger issue than the aircraft itself. It's a combination of things.
But then, playing devils advocate, should a photography student standing outside a tube station taking photos be stopped and searched? And so and so forth.>
You can do what you want on the tubes and no body will bother with you.
Please do take a tube ride on something like the Jubilee line in the rush hour.
You will see hundreds of people,pushing, shoving carrying brief cases, pullying along cases on wheels. These people are every race you can imagine.
One tube train will be packed with equal numbers of people in them as a large airliner and they roll into the tube station every couple of minutes.
You talk of potential forget potential here lies a massive risk. No security, no one questions what you hold in those bags and cases then we look at aviation? The whole thing is a farce!!! Why because the government know only too well that even minimal security on the London Tube system would bring the whole system to a halt and in turn would bring London to a chaotic standstill.
So they pretend that these real risk areas do not exist and target a soft option "aviation" Lord Carlisle worries his pretty little head over whether some tiny little wooden bi plane is going to cause a huge security threat.The poor aircraft would dissolve into a thousand splinters if it hit anything larger than a paper bag.
Then we have irresponsible newspapers like the Daily Mail who employ fiction writers to drum up a fantasy over something they know little about.
Every business jet in Europe is known about. Compared to cars the numbers are miniscule. The authorities know which airports they live in. They know who owns them. I fly as a Captain on business jets. When I turn up at the airport even the security men at the gates know me and who I fly for and I am sure the same goes for all the other Euopean business jets. The owners are known, the jets are usually maintained and operated by long established organisations and every IFR flight is traceable by a simple programme on a computer.
The Daily Mail and other thrill seeking tabloids would do a better service by pointing out the real dangers and threats to the safety and well being of our citizens rather than perpetuating the rubbish and scaremongering that churned out by government and the press.
Pace
>And here's something to consider, if you used any of the things you identified in a suspcious manner, in a public place, and were pinged for doing something that might lead to a view that you were up to no good, you'd be stopped and questioned. That's the bigger issue here G-EMMA and that's the issue that should be debated. If you were on the tube and were spotted concealing a battery pack inside a coke can or a bag of crisps, I expect someone would raise the alarm. And rightly so IMO because it's the environment that's the issue in addition to the act itself, the act of doing that in such an environment is open to question. GA is different because of the control one has over where one can be with the minimum of oversight. It strikes me as a bigger issue than the aircraft itself. It's a combination of things.
But then, playing devils advocate, should a photography student standing outside a tube station taking photos be stopped and searched? And so and so forth.>
You can do what you want on the tubes and no body will bother with you.
Please do take a tube ride on something like the Jubilee line in the rush hour.
You will see hundreds of people,pushing, shoving carrying brief cases, pullying along cases on wheels. These people are every race you can imagine.
One tube train will be packed with equal numbers of people in them as a large airliner and they roll into the tube station every couple of minutes.
You talk of potential forget potential here lies a massive risk. No security, no one questions what you hold in those bags and cases then we look at aviation? The whole thing is a farce!!! Why because the government know only too well that even minimal security on the London Tube system would bring the whole system to a halt and in turn would bring London to a chaotic standstill.
So they pretend that these real risk areas do not exist and target a soft option "aviation" Lord Carlisle worries his pretty little head over whether some tiny little wooden bi plane is going to cause a huge security threat.The poor aircraft would dissolve into a thousand splinters if it hit anything larger than a paper bag.
Then we have irresponsible newspapers like the Daily Mail who employ fiction writers to drum up a fantasy over something they know little about.
Every business jet in Europe is known about. Compared to cars the numbers are miniscule. The authorities know which airports they live in. They know who owns them. I fly as a Captain on business jets. When I turn up at the airport even the security men at the gates know me and who I fly for and I am sure the same goes for all the other Euopean business jets. The owners are known, the jets are usually maintained and operated by long established organisations and every IFR flight is traceable by a simple programme on a computer.
The Daily Mail and other thrill seeking tabloids would do a better service by pointing out the real dangers and threats to the safety and well being of our citizens rather than perpetuating the rubbish and scaremongering that churned out by government and the press.
Pace
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I am no nuclear weapon expert, though I have read a lot of stuff that has been declassified in recent decades, and the obvious Q to ask is:
If it is so apparently easy to get one's hands on a bomb, why is the UK, America, and a few other places (like Israel) still standing?
The IRA would have absolutely loved to blow up Buckingham Palace, Downing Street, etc. But they never managed anything like it.
The Muslim terrorists are much better funded than the IRA ever was, and they still haven't done this - yet there is zero doubt they would do this in an instant. Not a sovereign state, overtly (that would just cause some ICBM launches, wiping it off the map an hour later) but terrorists.
I think that building a bomb is simply much harder than people think. The simple designs are big and heavy (tons) and one would need something bigger than a bizjet to carry it. And it needs a lot of material which - in that volume - doesn't fall off the back of a lorry - not even at BNFL. The sophisticated compact designs are ... sophisticated and difficult to build, and those who have the designs have exactly zero interest in leaking them because the result could be used against them next. And you certainly cannot find the designs for the latter type on google. Not working designs.
If it was that easy, the things would be going off all over the place - delivered by vehicles.
If it is so apparently easy to get one's hands on a bomb, why is the UK, America, and a few other places (like Israel) still standing?
The IRA would have absolutely loved to blow up Buckingham Palace, Downing Street, etc. But they never managed anything like it.
The Muslim terrorists are much better funded than the IRA ever was, and they still haven't done this - yet there is zero doubt they would do this in an instant. Not a sovereign state, overtly (that would just cause some ICBM launches, wiping it off the map an hour later) but terrorists.
I think that building a bomb is simply much harder than people think. The simple designs are big and heavy (tons) and one would need something bigger than a bizjet to carry it. And it needs a lot of material which - in that volume - doesn't fall off the back of a lorry - not even at BNFL. The sophisticated compact designs are ... sophisticated and difficult to build, and those who have the designs have exactly zero interest in leaking them because the result could be used against them next. And you certainly cannot find the designs for the latter type on google. Not working designs.
If it was that easy, the things would be going off all over the place - delivered by vehicles.
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At the risk of repeating myself - I don't disagree with you at all. I totally agree with everything you say.
And yes - it could be construed as unfair and singling out a certain section of society for attention but all of the areas you discribe do not have any degree of regulation over them, you don't need to do anything to ride the tube or a bus. Hence the undue amount of CCTV and other overt and covert surveillance measures aimed at users of these services. Is it right or is it wrong? Not for me to say.
Part of this I think is the idea that the government could be criticised if something were to happen where a degree of regulation and oversight exist, GA is an example unfortunately. It's all very well identifying a risk but what did you do about it is the question that would be asked when the balloon goes up.
Road traffic is monitored, ANPR is everywhere now, you can be grassed up by your mobile phone that gives your position away to 10 feet, you appear on camera approx 300 times a day in London as a pedestrian I read somewhere recently, you cannot leave or enter the UK without someone knowing you've done it. You can send emails that are traced etc. And that's just the stuff that exists to benefit the private sector, one can only imagaine what the government has at it's disposal.
I think if you analyse what is going on generally in terms of state control in the UK, you'll see very quickly, and acknowledge, that GA is the last bastion of more decent and trusting times but it's the most decent and trusting of us that ultimately get's done over by the cads.
'We're self policing and self regulating' cannot cut it anymore, sad but true I'm afraid.
And that's something worth discussing.
And yes - it could be construed as unfair and singling out a certain section of society for attention but all of the areas you discribe do not have any degree of regulation over them, you don't need to do anything to ride the tube or a bus. Hence the undue amount of CCTV and other overt and covert surveillance measures aimed at users of these services. Is it right or is it wrong? Not for me to say.
Part of this I think is the idea that the government could be criticised if something were to happen where a degree of regulation and oversight exist, GA is an example unfortunately. It's all very well identifying a risk but what did you do about it is the question that would be asked when the balloon goes up.
Road traffic is monitored, ANPR is everywhere now, you can be grassed up by your mobile phone that gives your position away to 10 feet, you appear on camera approx 300 times a day in London as a pedestrian I read somewhere recently, you cannot leave or enter the UK without someone knowing you've done it. You can send emails that are traced etc. And that's just the stuff that exists to benefit the private sector, one can only imagaine what the government has at it's disposal.
I think if you analyse what is going on generally in terms of state control in the UK, you'll see very quickly, and acknowledge, that GA is the last bastion of more decent and trusting times but it's the most decent and trusting of us that ultimately get's done over by the cads.
'We're self policing and self regulating' cannot cut it anymore, sad but true I'm afraid.
And that's something worth discussing.
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G-EMMA wrote:
OK qwertyplops, lets throw the argument back your way -
Take the club I fly at.
I need to have flown within the last 28 days to be current before I can get near an aeroplane.
I plan a terrorist attack, lets say we are going to fill a PA-28 with explosives and fly it into some soft target.
I have to have a licence, a medical, the ability to fly the aeroplane, navigate accurately and the weather has to be good for VFR else I will be in IMC and crash any way. Or I need an instrument rated pilot to do the deed for me.
So I have all of this and somehow in the view of the entire club and any members of the public I have to load the aircraft with said explosives... have you not realised yet that the whole scenerio is pure fantasy. I doubt if you have ever been around light aircraft as your entire argument is based from some entirely hyperthetical stance that a light aircraft could be used by terrorists. Yes it could, but it isn't likely and isn't practical. Terrorists could also dump azo dyes in the London water supply, that hasn't happened either and I doubt anyone would suggest that nobody use tap water just in case it did one day. Terrorists could hijack and strategically place fuel tankers under all the major intersections leading into London and blow them up... hmmmmm lets ban tankers or at least make them fill in a form before they can go on the road (or do they already???)
Terrorist acts are aimed to have an affect on the whole nations sense of security and lifestyle, I do not see light aircraft as a likely tool, neither do I see any way of sensibly preventing the possibility that they could be used anymore than I believe that the tube could be sensibly protected other than by permenantly shutting it down, best ban buses as well as the ex service vehicles...
The point is lots of things could be done by terrorists and to mitigate all of them gives you Squeegee Longtail's point. What a horrendous world it would be to live in. Safeguard one and the terrorist will turn to another.
The only reason GA is being highlighted is that it will be dead easy to mandate any silly restrictions the government can dream up and probably we will also have to pay for the administration in the process, all for a percieved threat that never existed anymore than any other. You still couldn't stop a terrorist purchasing a light aircraft and flying it out of a strip could you? So it will be all those that posed no risk that will suffer the consequences with no real reduction in the potential 'threat'. (which in my opinion only exists in fantasy) Today 18:58
Why the need to be so patronising G-EMMA?
You fly a light aircraft and all of a sudden you are an expert on national security and intelligence? With the greatest of respect, you and I know as much as the Daily Mail tells us about these things, we all do.
Why, as I keep saying, are you focusing on simply the aircraft as a method of delivery? There are so many more angles to this. You are missing the point with respect, the point is that the debate is upon us and it's time to make sensible points to the right people. Just because your club does things in a certain way and that they are all decent folks does not mean a thing anymore. That's the reality of this issue. How can this have passed you by?
Trying to belittle me for simply saying 'I get it' is pointless.
I have given an opinion, it's unlikely to change, and that's that.
OK qwertyplops, lets throw the argument back your way -
Take the club I fly at.
I need to have flown within the last 28 days to be current before I can get near an aeroplane.
I plan a terrorist attack, lets say we are going to fill a PA-28 with explosives and fly it into some soft target.
I have to have a licence, a medical, the ability to fly the aeroplane, navigate accurately and the weather has to be good for VFR else I will be in IMC and crash any way. Or I need an instrument rated pilot to do the deed for me.
So I have all of this and somehow in the view of the entire club and any members of the public I have to load the aircraft with said explosives... have you not realised yet that the whole scenerio is pure fantasy. I doubt if you have ever been around light aircraft as your entire argument is based from some entirely hyperthetical stance that a light aircraft could be used by terrorists. Yes it could, but it isn't likely and isn't practical. Terrorists could also dump azo dyes in the London water supply, that hasn't happened either and I doubt anyone would suggest that nobody use tap water just in case it did one day. Terrorists could hijack and strategically place fuel tankers under all the major intersections leading into London and blow them up... hmmmmm lets ban tankers or at least make them fill in a form before they can go on the road (or do they already???)
Terrorist acts are aimed to have an affect on the whole nations sense of security and lifestyle, I do not see light aircraft as a likely tool, neither do I see any way of sensibly preventing the possibility that they could be used anymore than I believe that the tube could be sensibly protected other than by permenantly shutting it down, best ban buses as well as the ex service vehicles...
The point is lots of things could be done by terrorists and to mitigate all of them gives you Squeegee Longtail's point. What a horrendous world it would be to live in. Safeguard one and the terrorist will turn to another.
The only reason GA is being highlighted is that it will be dead easy to mandate any silly restrictions the government can dream up and probably we will also have to pay for the administration in the process, all for a percieved threat that never existed anymore than any other. You still couldn't stop a terrorist purchasing a light aircraft and flying it out of a strip could you? So it will be all those that posed no risk that will suffer the consequences with no real reduction in the potential 'threat'. (which in my opinion only exists in fantasy) Today 18:58
Why the need to be so patronising G-EMMA?
You fly a light aircraft and all of a sudden you are an expert on national security and intelligence? With the greatest of respect, you and I know as much as the Daily Mail tells us about these things, we all do.
Why, as I keep saying, are you focusing on simply the aircraft as a method of delivery? There are so many more angles to this. You are missing the point with respect, the point is that the debate is upon us and it's time to make sensible points to the right people. Just because your club does things in a certain way and that they are all decent folks does not mean a thing anymore. That's the reality of this issue. How can this have passed you by?
Trying to belittle me for simply saying 'I get it' is pointless.
I have given an opinion, it's unlikely to change, and that's that.
Last edited by qwertyplop; 29th Jun 2008 at 18:28.
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Well, to be honest G-EMMA, your comment about being around an aircraft grated a bit and if you can dole it out then you have to be able to take it.
And now I find myself dragged into a disagreement which was the last thing I wanted. It's an emotive issue and I accept that and please believe me when I say that I actually agree with most of what you say. As for joining the 'thought police' - I don't think they could afford me.
Have a good evening.
And now I find myself dragged into a disagreement which was the last thing I wanted. It's an emotive issue and I accept that and please believe me when I say that I actually agree with most of what you say. As for joining the 'thought police' - I don't think they could afford me.
Have a good evening.
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Qwetryplop
I can undertstand your position, but, as an aged pilot, have little sympathy with it.
There are a lot of people out there who are prepared to give up on their civil rights because they have been persuaded that by doing so, they will make the world a safer place
Rot.....
There is absolutely no point in playing the government's game, as they are generally a bunch of amateurs, scared to death about losing a single civilian life. The fact that over a hundred military deaths have been caused by their failure to behave in what any rational person would consider acceptable is glossed over.
Sh*t happens. If an asteroid were to hit central London that is fate. During the last war death was a daily experience and people accepted it - unfair though it may be.
Our current bunch of politicos (and those never exposed to the death and suffering of war) are scared rigid of losing access to their Internet access or of having their credit card cloned. They have lost all sense of perspective.
But what scares me most of all, as someone who works daily with massive UK databases, is the way that people are surrendering their right to a personal life, unencumbered by government overview.
You, Qwertyplop, seem to have been convinced that the threat (unquantified and unjustified) is so great that you are prepared to give up on what we consider is so good about our lives in the UK.
I am prepared to stand up to this Stalinist control-freakery - I hope that others are
I can undertstand your position, but, as an aged pilot, have little sympathy with it.
There are a lot of people out there who are prepared to give up on their civil rights because they have been persuaded that by doing so, they will make the world a safer place
Rot.....
There is absolutely no point in playing the government's game, as they are generally a bunch of amateurs, scared to death about losing a single civilian life. The fact that over a hundred military deaths have been caused by their failure to behave in what any rational person would consider acceptable is glossed over.
Sh*t happens. If an asteroid were to hit central London that is fate. During the last war death was a daily experience and people accepted it - unfair though it may be.
Our current bunch of politicos (and those never exposed to the death and suffering of war) are scared rigid of losing access to their Internet access or of having their credit card cloned. They have lost all sense of perspective.
But what scares me most of all, as someone who works daily with massive UK databases, is the way that people are surrendering their right to a personal life, unencumbered by government overview.
You, Qwertyplop, seem to have been convinced that the threat (unquantified and unjustified) is so great that you are prepared to give up on what we consider is so good about our lives in the UK.
I am prepared to stand up to this Stalinist control-freakery - I hope that others are
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Robin wrote;
You, Qwertyplop, seem to have been convinced that the threat (unquantified and unjustified) is so great that you are prepared to give up on what we consider is so good about our lives in the UK.
Thank you Robin for the response. I am not convinced actually, far from it.
But in the same way that I am not convinced by the governments position, I am far from convinced by the GA position of 'we're awfully nice chaps don't you know'.
And I completely agree with your view on military deaths and, from my own point of view, the stupidity and vanity shown by faceless cowards sending men and women to their deaths, badly equipped in ill thought through and conceived misadventures, is criminal. I'd put New Labour in the dock for that if I could. In fact, we are relocating to New Zealand just because of much of what has been written here, we concluded much of this some time ago so let me be clear on that too.
But I have faith in those who would protect me. I have faith in the police and the security services, I trust them more than I would ever trust the government. That might make me naive but they, like our armed forces, are there because of duty and obligation and I see it as my duty to assist them wherever possible to counter a threat they are clearly convinced exists on whatever level.
We are a divided society, much of which is the governments fault but I am clear in my responsibility to my fellow citizen and this is manifested by my belief that I should assist wherever possible in this issue.
You, Qwertyplop, seem to have been convinced that the threat (unquantified and unjustified) is so great that you are prepared to give up on what we consider is so good about our lives in the UK.
Thank you Robin for the response. I am not convinced actually, far from it.
But in the same way that I am not convinced by the governments position, I am far from convinced by the GA position of 'we're awfully nice chaps don't you know'.
And I completely agree with your view on military deaths and, from my own point of view, the stupidity and vanity shown by faceless cowards sending men and women to their deaths, badly equipped in ill thought through and conceived misadventures, is criminal. I'd put New Labour in the dock for that if I could. In fact, we are relocating to New Zealand just because of much of what has been written here, we concluded much of this some time ago so let me be clear on that too.
But I have faith in those who would protect me. I have faith in the police and the security services, I trust them more than I would ever trust the government. That might make me naive but they, like our armed forces, are there because of duty and obligation and I see it as my duty to assist them wherever possible to counter a threat they are clearly convinced exists on whatever level.
We are a divided society, much of which is the governments fault but I am clear in my responsibility to my fellow citizen and this is manifested by my belief that I should assist wherever possible in this issue.
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But I have faith in those who would protect me. I have faith in the police and the security services, I trust them more than I would ever trust the government. That might make me naive but they, like our armed forces, are there because of duty and obligation and I see it as my duty to assist them wherever possible to counter a threat they are clearly convinced exists on whatever level.
Take the situation of the army being sent into Heathrow after a security alert. The reality is there is 17 miles between Central London and the airport where someone could lauch an RPG or SAM missile and guarantee bringing it down. Yet the Army went into the centre of Heathrow where you can't see an aircraft at all.
Obviously it was PR to show they were doing something.
They are likely to use Lord Carlile's concerns to wind up the politicos who know b*gg*r all. If you want more resources or more authority tell the idiot MPs that there is a credible threat and hope they don't ask difficult questions - they don't usually
Politicos like this sort of thing as it means they can grab more power
As I said earlier, sh*t happens and an engine-out, like the recent Heathrow incident can happen with, or without terrorist help. Politicos need to accept this and accept that a certain number of people are likely to be killed or injured through any form of incident.
They can't know everything and one day the bad guys will get through. It is wrong for them to pretend that they can stop any and all threats. And it is more grown-up of us to accept that life itself is a risk
The problem is that we, as a people, are colluding with the rulers who want to make life more repressive on the promise that all will be well if we give up our civil liberties
If we do so, we will never get them back, and a regime, such as that in Zimbabwe, could use these laws to destroy any and all protections we enjoy.
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I'm with robin on this one. All I require of Her Majesty's Government is that they leave me alone to get on with my life. I am well aware that the world is a risky place, but frankly I'd prefer to manage that risk without their help.