Crotch Rocket

Everybody wanted to get in the newspaper story about it.
And they was using up all kinds of
cop equipment that they had hanging around the police officer's station.
They was taking plaster tire tracks, foot prints, dog smelling prints, and
they took twenty seven eight-by-ten color glossy photographs with circles
and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one explaining what each
one was to be used as evidence against us. Took pictures of the approach,
the getaway, the northwest corner the southwest corner and that's not to
mention the aerial photography
--Alice's Restaurant, Arlo Guthrie
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Some further comments on the hapless would-be Christmas day aircraft bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.

It was brought to our attention that a recent t.v. program filmed the detonation of an 80 gram PETN device on a titanium plate using a hyperelectric charge, and the resultant blast ostensibly twisted and deformed the plate.

Ranger will address this fear-mongering:

• Was this production or home-made PETN?

• Was the crotch bomber's stash home-made or factory-made? There is a difference.

• Where would the crotch bomber get a source of electricity, as used in the demonstration?

• Even had the bomb detonated, how would this have brought an aircraft down?

If the bomber were a sophisticated and dedicated al-Qaeda operative with training and ability, he would have planted the device, primed it, and would have had it explode on the next leg of the aircraft's itinerary. Abdulmutallab's failed attempt demonstrates a very low-level of tradecraft.

The television tests are pure theater, with no relation to the reality of the explosive potential of this device.

The only lesson Ranger gets from this incident is definitely not to wear designer underwear. We're glad the basic brief is coming back strong (Even Less for Men to Think About).