In the post-9/11 era of tight security in which the so-called Islamic State has urged followers to grab whatever they can find as a weapon and just go for it, public attention has been diverted to low-tech, unsophisticated terrorism plots.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Knives, cars, trucks, small arms – in countries where they are relatively easily available, which thankfully does not include Australia – have been the trend. Capture it on a mobile phone and you get high impact for relatively little investment.
Yet authorities have been warning all along that this doesn't mean they've taken their eye off the threat of more elaborate plots.
If the alleged plot at the centre of this weekend's raids proves real, it will bring home this warning in a dramatic fashion. One security source indeed described this case as being in "a different league".
It's hardly a cinch to get a bomb on board a plane these days, but then as AFP Commissioner Andrew Colvin pointed out on Sunday morning terrorists are "very ingenious about figuring out new ways to defeat our security mechanisms".
Think of the shoe bomber, the underpants bomber, the recent fears about laptops.
It's difficult to say at this early stage how realistic a chance this group had of carrying out what the police and government say they have disrupted.
But it's worth noting that authorities began quietly tightening Sydney airport security on Thursday, which signals they thought the risk was real enough well before they raided any properties.
However horrifying attacks on so-called "soft targets" such as members of the public on the street or at a teen pop concert might be, aviation still holds a mystique when it comes to terrorism.
Plane travel traps large numbers of people in remarkable positions of vulnerability high above the ground for hours.
There is still something about the idea of bringing down a plane that strikes a particular chord of fear.
The people targeted in the raids appear to be affiliated with what police and security agencies regard as established networks, they are not newcomers.
If an established extremist network in Australia is thinking in terms of taking down a plane with a bomb, they are showing a frightening level of ambition that swims against current of spontaneous self-radicalisation to which we've grown used in the Islamic State era.
