Posted on 04/22/2002 7:22:04 PM PDT by knak
NBC: Terror network seeks material to explode bomb in U.S.
WASHINGTON, April 22 — A captured key strategist for the al-Qaida network told interrogators Monday that al-Qaida was working to obtain fissionable material for radiation bombs to be exploded in the United States, NBC News has learned. U.S. officials could not confirm the assertions of the strategist, Abu Zubaydah, but said they were taking him at his word.
SOURCES TOLD NBC News that Zubaydah, believed to be one of the top lieutenants of Osama bin Laden, believed to be the mastermind of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States, was cooperating with his interrogators. Officials said they did not know how to evaluate his information but were taking him seriously about bombs.
The officials said they would give Zubaydah’s information about al-Qaida’s quest for fissionable material the same consideration they gave a warning the U.S. government issued to banks Friday.
In that warning, the government said “unsubstantiated information” pointed to a possible terrorist threat against financial institutions. The FBI did not elaborate on that threat, but administration officials told NBC News that Zubaydah had revealed a possible plot to send suicide bombers into banks in the northeastern United States.
In the warning Monday, Zubaydah told U.S. investigators that al-Qaida operatives already had the knowledge to build the bomb, but he did not say that such a weapon had already been delivered to the United States, sources said.
Zubaydah is in U.S. custody at an undisclosed location. He is being treated for gunshot wounds he suffered when he was captured during a raid by Pakistani forces in Faisalabad on March 28.
Court testimony in the United States and in Jordan showed that Zubaydah effectively directed the so-called Millennium Plot, a plan to attack hotels and tourist sites in Jordan and at Los Angeles International Airport on New Year’s Day 2000. He has been sentenced to death in absentia in Jordan.
He is also believed to have directed the deadly bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen in October 2000. Seventeen U.S. sailors were killed in that attack.
It's mostly a function of where to go and how much time we have. We want to take the kids to Gettysburg, then out to Yellowstone. Only so many vacation weeks in the year. We'll do D.C. next year. We were there for the 4th of July 1987 with our older two boys, and it was awesome! We were very near the Capitol Building! The only drag was it took us an hour to get back to the metro and another hour to get to Gaithersburg where we were staying with family!
I found these searching in www.webshots.com under "mecca" and "meteor crater".
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