I assume American Express would track abandoned applications, and abandonment would be evidence that the applicant is primarily interested in the bonus.
While that would seem obvious enough, I actually never thought of that. It's a good point. Plus I like your info about cobranded cards. Guess my strategy might be to really focus on adding spend for a few months, apply for a cobranded card and hope for approval. Then if I play nice for a bit hopefully jail break in time to be aproved for a Plat before a planed trip late 2022.
thanks!