"Memo notes US feared jet attack prior to 9/11"

Saturday, December 10, 2005

US told Saudis about Qaeda plane threat pre-9/11

  
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States told Saudi Arabia more than three
years before the September 11 attacks that Osama bin Laden might be
targeting civilian airplanes, according to a newly declassified State
Department cable.

The June 1998 cable, obtained by George Washington University's National
Security Archive under the Freedom of Information Act, said the United
States had no specific information that al Qaeda was planning such an
attack, and did not say it might fly planes into buildings.

A copy of the cable, first reported by The New York Times on Friday, was
obtained by Reuters. Fifteen of the 19 hijackers on September 11, 2001, were
Saudi nationals.

The cable, from the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh to U.S. government officials,
said concerns were based on threats bin Laden had recently made against
military aircraft in an interview with U.S. network ABC.

"We could not rule out that a terrorist might take the course of least
resistance and turn to a civilian target," the cable said, noting bin Laden
had said his group did not differentiate between civilians and the military.

The cable said three U.S. officials had met with Saudi officials at Riyadh's
King Khaled International Airport on June 16, 1998, "to discuss the Osama
bin Laden threat, and press for enhanced vigilance by Saudi security
screeners and police patrols around the airport."

"We noted that while we have no specific information that indicates bin
Laden is targeting civilian aircraft, he made a threat during the June 11
ABC News interview against 'military passenger aircraft' in the next 'few
weeks,'" the cable said.

The cable is the latest of several signs made public that U.S. officials had
concerns, long before the 2001 hijacked airplane attacks on New York and
Washington, that al Qaeda might be targeting aircraft.

Others include a highly classified President's Daily Brief report to former
President Bill Clinton dated December 4, 1998, which was titled "Bin Ladin
Preparing to Hijack US Aircraft and Other Attacks."

The CIA has also said it had told the Federal Aviation Administration in
1999 that "Osama bin Laden remains interested in targeting U.S. interests
including on U.S. territory. He is well prepared to consider kidnappings and
hijackings as well as bombings."

On August 6, 2001, President George W. Bush's daily intelligence brief said
the FBI had detected "patterns of suspicious activity in this country
consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks,
including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York."

It did not warn of an airplane attack on buildings, but said the FBI was
conducting about 70 investigations throughout the United States that it
considered were related to bin Laden.

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