They'd a figured it out in a Tom Clancey novel or if one of us sci-fi fans were in charge of Nat'l Security. :)
In a perfect world, knowing that the ragheads planned to fly planes into buildings, a mature govt that trusted its citizens would have propagated knowlege of this tactic and told folks NOT to surrender control of an airplane. Believe me, with passengers and crew knowing that in advance the WTC would still be standing.

I do not criticize the govt for not somehow guessing and stoping this. I DO criticize them for the false sense of security by having Federal employees do the terminal security. This has not made us safer. I criticise Bush's govt for not coming up with any solutions or alternatives besides happy talk, color warning schemes, ignoring the continued problem of uncontrolled immigration, complete inaction against the financiers of terrorism- the Saudis, and there has been no interdiction of sources of WMD. I confess to being a bit impatient, but the idea that a big federal bureaucracy solves airport security is a joke.

-p