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Comment by ido | Hacker News Reader

I wonder why a more common tactic isn't to simply ride a lot of busses until one of them is packed full while driving on the highway at full speed, then launching at the steering wheel to turn it basically any direction...Sounds like a pretty good chance of a pile up and lots of casualties, with no evidence the perpetrator is anything other than a normal passenger until it's too late.

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because the goal of terrorism is awareness that there are evil assholes out there.

they want to get caught. the casualties are a means to an end. if you just kill a bunch of people without anyone noticing it, nothings been gained in terms of effective terrorizing.

terrorists want to be freddy krueger, not the rollercoaster from final destination.

How is it any different from suicide bombing tho? The terrorist organizations can still take credit for the bus-on-highway-terror just like they take credit posthumously for the suicide bombings.

Yeah. Actually, your idea is even scarier than the usual attacks, because with suicide bombers you can at least expect them to be discovered given enough police and intelligence resources (if by need of controlling the flow of ingredients to explosive substances). But otherwise random people causing unexpected public transport crashes? That would be literally terror.

They could already do that for random accidents not actually caused by them. Why don't they?

Why not try to claim they made the malaysian air flight disappear?

I'm not sure, but it doesnt seem to be on their agenda.

Terrorist code of conduct. "Thou shall not claim casualties you didn't cause."

> Terrorist code of conduct. "Thou shall not claim casualties you didn't cause."

That's because if you are ever disproved, you lose credibility for future claims.

That's orthogonal to the merit of using such "mundane-looking" tactics and then rightfully claiming involvement.

youd think that its incredibly easy for a terrorist to regain lost credibility.

duh?

remember what happened last time nobody took them seriously? a generation of conspiracy nutters was born.

Nobody taking them seriously is the only way to stop them. Compare with people starting to take them seriously, which brought us at least three country-destroying wars, trillions of dollars of waste, and the erosion of citizen rights in the whole western world - all within last two decades.

> remember what happened last time nobody took them seriously? a generation of conspiracy nutters was born.

I think that it's my fault, but I honestly don't know what you're referring to. 9/11? The Kennedy assassinations? In any case, how does not taking terrorists seriously create conspiracy theorists?

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