Remember the Phoenix memo?
On July 10, 2001, a Special Agent (SA) in the FBI's Phoenix Division sent an EC to individuals in the Usama Bin Ladin Unit (UBLU) and the Radical Fundamentalist Unit (RFU) within the Counter terrorism Division at FBI headquarters and to several SAs on an International Terrorism squad in the New York Field Office. In the EC, the SA outlined his concerns that there was a coordinated effort underway by Usama Bin Ladin to send students to the United States for civil aviation related training. He noted that there were an "inordinate number of individuals of investigative interest" attending this type of training in Arizona and speculated that this was part of an effort to establish a cadre of individuals in civil aviation who would be in position to conduct terrorist activity in the future.
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In addition, several Bin Ladin operatives had lived and traveled to the Phoenix area in the past, one of whom was Wadih El-Hage, a Bin Ladin lieutenant convicted for his role in the 1998 embassy bombings. He had lived in the Tucson area for several years in the 1980s. The Phoenix SA believes that El-Hage established a Usama Bin Ladin support network in Arizona while he was living there and that this network is still in place.