Yes...I think I know what is going on...
Somehow, I think the terrorists have devised a way to make these planes divert...but NOT have done anything worthy of jail..
I think they KNOW that if they do this often enough...and nothing, no bomb, no bomb carrying Muslims, are found...
Then the customers of the airlines are going to get tired of it..and complain...and the airlines will be more and more reluctant to divert and force an all over search..
And, THEN, when the airlines are back to their lackadaisical ways....THEN, they will pull one of their plans to take down 10-20 planes..
This is called Terrorism 101.
Can you put this in Breaking?
Then maybe we ought to start offering mid flight ejections.
I think it's more likely that they're probing to determine how many flights tend to have air marshalls, how many air marshalls per flight, and what their procedures are. One or more Muslims on the plane pulls this stunt and gets arrested. Their partners keep a low profile, don't get involved, and simply watch and report back.
Just my hunch.
This has been my thoughts, too. They don't have to get arrested for terrorism to cause disruption and they have plenty of patience. We've already seen just how whiney the idiot passengers can be over security measures. People also think they have this right to know EVERYTHING, like the government is going to share intelligence data with them just so they know there was and is a credible threat.
This also has the added affect of making liberals/media question if the leaders like Blair and Bush are in on some whacko plot to use terrorism as a diversion which undermines the governments efforts on terrorism. On one had they want all the terrorist caught and on the other hand they will crucify you if you stop a potential plot before there are actual dead bodies to prove their was a plot. As you predict, we are going to end up with a lot of planes coming down before it's all over because people will get tired of being on alert all the time and they don't want to trust our government at all because it inconveniences them.
Good theory, Txsleuth. Frankly, I think if they can keep this fiendish behavior up long enough, people will get really tired of it, stop flying and the airlines will reduce fleets and lay off people. That economic damage could be even greater than that caused by actually blowing up planes. And as you say, not one of them would go to jail.
It reminds me a lot of the fake computer virus a few years ago where you were tricked into forwarding the email warning about a virus to all your friends. The "virus" was the flood of email unleashed by all the do-gooders that trustingly forwarded the email, thus slowing down all mail traffic. No real computer virus was ever needed to cause damage.