>"The most such an attacker could hope to accomplish [...]" //
I think you're lacking imagination there.
"If pressure was lost at that altitude, everyone aboard would have been incapacitated almost immediately. Autopsies will tell if they died before the crash or from the impact."
It seems like a rapid/explosive depressurisation event would be possible to create from inside the cabin with an explosive weapon. I'm not saying that's going to down the aircraft but it seems it would create more of an incident than your imagined scenario.
The pilots should have time to don oxygen masks unless pressure is lost very rapidly at very high altitude. I'm doubtful that just shooting the plane is an effective way to accomplish this.
Doesn't have to be a bullet. In the link (which is a small plane) a door/window seal is suspected as the cause of bringing down the plane. But surely if you can compromise a seal or something and cause a rapid decompression that's going to more than likely kill some passengers at ~12km cruising altitude.
Looked at other cites and there was a study on pilots showing that even a 2s delay from decompression to them fitting masks was significant in reduced control.
My point was only to challenge that the very worst you could do was cause a minor panic without affecting the mechanical flight at all or injuring more than maybe 1 or 2 people.
I didn't check but IIRC that Wikipedia article refers only a bullet passing through the fuselage? In which case the hole is too small to cause even rapid decompression.
I think you're lacking imagination there.
"If pressure was lost at that altitude, everyone aboard would have been incapacitated almost immediately. Autopsies will tell if they died before the crash or from the impact."
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/sports/golf/stewart/stewfs05....
It seems like a rapid/explosive depressurisation event would be possible to create from inside the cabin with an explosive weapon. I'm not saying that's going to down the aircraft but it seems it would create more of an incident than your imagined scenario.