THE WELL-ARMED SKIES George Will nypost.com June 6, 2002 -- THE next perpetrators of terrorism in America probably are already here, perhaps planning more hijackings. Security measures may have made hijackings slightly more difficult, but the fact that these are America's most visible anti-terrorist measures vastly increases the payoff in proving the measures incapable of keeping terrorists off airplanes. Recently this column presented, without endorsement, the views of three commercial airline pilots who oppose guns in cockpits. Today's column presents, and endorses, the views of three other commercial airline pilots - two trained as fighter pilots, one civilian-trained. The three pilots who favor allowing pilots to choose whether to carry guns respond: A cockpit impenetrably sealed from terrorists is an impossibility, in part because planes cannot be landed as quickly as the other three pilots say. Landing a plane from 30,000 feet requires at least 20 minutes, never just 10. Trans-Atlantic flights can be three hours from a suitable airport. Such airports are not abundant west of Iowa. On most flights, terrorists would have time to penetrate the cockpit. Bulletproof doors are not the answer: The Sept. 11 terrorists had no bullets. Well-trained terrorists can blow even a much-reinforced cockpit door off its hinges using a thin thread of malleable explosive that can pass undetected through passenger screening procedures when carried on a person rather than in luggage. Here is what else can be undetected by security screeners busy confiscating grandmothers' knitting needles: The knife with the six-inch serrated blade that a passenger found, in a post-Sept. 11 flight, secreted under her seat. Two semiautomatic pistols that recently passed unnoticed through metal detectors and were discovered only when the owner's bags were selected for a random search at the gate. A mostly plastic .22- caliber gun that looks like a cell phone. An entirely plastic and razor-sharp knife. A "bloodsucker" - it looks like a fountain pen but has a cylindrical blade that can inflict a neck wound that will not stop bleeding. The idea that arming pilots is a means of justifying a third pilot is derisory: Re-engineering cockpits for that would be impossibly complex. Equally implausible is the idea that a Taser (electric stun gun) is a satisfactory aid when locked in a plane, seven miles up, with trained terrorists. A pilot's gun would never leave the cockpit because the pilot never would. And shooting a terrorist in the cockpit door frame would not require a Marine sniper's skill. The powerful pressurization controls, as well as the location and redundancy of aircraft electronic, hydraulic and other systems, vastly reduces the probability that even multiple wayward gun shots - even of bullets that are not frangible - would cripple an aircraft. About fear of "fighter-pilot mentality": The military assiduously schools and screens pilot candidates to eliminate unstable or undisciplined candidates. Airlines, too, administer severe selection procedures for pilots, who are constantly scrutinized. Captains have two physical examinations a year (first officers, one) with psychological components. Everything said in the cockpit is recorded. Besides, many passengers fly armed - county sheriffs, FBI and Secret Service agents, postal inspectors, foreign bodyguards of foreign dignitaries. Why, then, must the people on whom all passengers' lives depend - pilots - be unarmed? To thicken the layers of deterrence and security, in the air as well as on the ground, Congress should promptly enact legislation to empower pilots to choose to carry guns. Time flies. So do hijackers. And the next ones probably are already among us. -- David Ross http://home.attbi.com/~damiross