In Overheard Calls, Terrorists Spoke of Major Attack, Officials Say

New York Times ^ | 11/02/01 | JAMES RISEN and DAVID JOHNSTON

[kattracks]

ASHINGTON, Nov. 1 — Government officials intercepted telephone conversations in recent days in which members of Osama bin Laden's terrorist network, Al Qaeda, spoke urgently of an imminent attack against American targets even larger than the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, senior government officials say.

Intelligence reports based on the intercepted communications frightened the officials who read them and played a decisive role in the Bush administration's decision to issue its latest warning Monday of an imminent terrorist attack, the senior officials said.

Al Qaeda intercepts were interpreted as extraordinarily clear signals of potential danger in part because of the urgent and serious tone of the conversations. Officials said the terrorist operatives were overheard talking about an operation that would be even bigger than the Sept. 11 hijackings. Officials said they intercepted several of these conversations between Al Qaeda members in several countries.

Counterterrorism analysts at the C.I.A. and F.B.I. who reviewed the intercepts judged their credibility to be high also because they determined that the participants believed no one was eavesdropping on their discussions, the officials added.

The reports, supported by other intelligence, were rushed to President Bush and his national security aides on Monday morning. Senior national security officials were quickly persuaded that the potential threat was grave. But the debate at the White House over whether to issue an alert lasted several hours. Some counterterrorism officials expressed strong disagreement with issuing another nonspecific alert like the warning issued on Oct. 10.

When the administration issued the public warning of another attack on Monday, senior members of Congress criticized the decision, saying it raised fears among Americans without providing any specific information that would allow the nation to prepare. But the administration said the intercepts were so worrying that they had little choice.

Officials who have seen the intelligence reports said they raised greater concerns than did the intelligence that prompted the Oct. 10 warning. The latest intercepts indicated that Al Qaeda operatives were talking about a big event and discussed a specific time frame for action, prompting the government to warn of a terrorist attack within the week.

The intercepted communications did not provide specific clues about where the attacks might come, and the intelligence did not indicate whether the terrorists were planning actions inside the United States or against American interests overseas. The reports also did not even suggest the nature of the plot or the methods, officials said.

Tom Ridge, director of homeland security; George Tenet, director of central intelligence; Robert S. Mueller III, the F.B.I. director; and Attorney General John Ashcroft were each advised of the threat soon after the intelligence was collected. The information, along with sanitized but still secret summaries, was described in secret briefings for a few top lawmakers, officials said.

Throughout Monday, the government's still evolving threat-assessment network worked to reach a consensus on whether to issue a new alert — knowing that the Oct. 10 warning was criticized by lawmakers and state and local authorities for spreading fear without offering any information about where or how terrorists might strike.

As a result, some senior officials at the Federal Bureau of Investigation were reluctant to recommend issuing a second warning on Monday. But Mr. Ashcroft and other senior administration officials were persuaded that the threat was too significant to be ignored. In the end, the White House said it was Mr. Bush who made the decision to issue the threat warning, the officials said.

Officials also said they hoped the warning would persuade state and local authorities to increase their vigilance. They added that they had believed an attack was imminent when they issued the Oct. 10th warning, but that it was delayed or prevented, possibly as a result of the arrests and detentions of suspected Al Qaeda operatives in the United States and overseas.

Frustration by state and local officials about the vague nature of the warnings on both Oct. 10 and Monday may help explain the F.B.I.'s decision to issue a more specific warning that terrorists were planning rush- hour attacks against four California bridges, possibly as early as Friday. Senior officials added, however, that they found the intelligence behind that threat less credible than the intelligence leading to the national warning issued on Monday.

Gov. Gray Davis of California, who announced the threat warning this afternoon, said law enforcement officials believed that the Golden Gate Bridge or Bay Bridge, both in San Francisco, the Vincent Thomas Bridge at the Port of Los Angeles or the Coronado Bridge in San Diego were all potential targets.

While the intelligence that prompted Monday's warning was general, officials have scrambled to respond to potential vulnerabilities. Aviation authorities have barred flights over nuclear power plants and have created a no-fly zone in the vicinity of buildings thought to be potential targets, like the Sears Tower in Chicago.

[Crispy]

It's normal to be scared, but you don't have to spread hysteria here on FR. Just keep your guns loaded and you will be fine.

[Wait4Truth]

Hating the President seems an irrational response to this situation. Get a grip.

[Clinton's a rapist]

I vote for A. Let him die like a dog, cowering in his lair. Works for me.

[Jim Noble]

>> if war were declared<<

Congress also has the power to define and punish "Offences against the law of Nations", which terrorism certainly is.

[Husker8877]

You wimpy, hysterical wuss. Thank God we don't have chicken littles like you in positions of power

You are a perfect liberal. Go join them. Somewhere. Anywhere (else)!

[okie01]

"My own first option: Fry the idiots inside their caves with neutron bombs, and then walk in there..."

Neutron bombs wouldn't be effective against a cave. The earth surrounding it would shield the occupants.

[boycott]

I agree. There PC bs is killing America.

[germanshepherd]

I agree with your first sentiments. Deport them ALL. Forget PC. Forget worrying about whether someone will think "we're being mean" or insensitive or whatever. Forget what the media will say about us. DEPORT THEM.

If President Bush does not do this as we think he should, I do not see that getting a democrat elected will be of any practical help to the situation, and right now we do need to be very practical. We cannot afford to float off on a cloud of righteous indignation, at the expense of having the best person available to man our ship at this crucial period. Gettin a damn-rat elected would, in fact, only make things much much worse, and we don't want that.

Go President Bush! I'm behind you all the way. (Though nipping at your heels to deport all non-citizen Mideasterners.)

[takenoprisoner]

That´s best case scenario if we don´t get our sh$$ together.

I know you meant the worst. In any case, getting our sh$$ together will require realization by leaders of the free world (Bush and Blair) who the enemy is.

[culpeper]

I guarantee that if a democrat was in the white house right now they would have turned this whole operation over to the U.N. and it would be a cluster&*ck. One huge fault with the gulf war was that Bush Sr. followed the U.N. resolution which was to get Iraq out of Kuwait and thats where he stopped. Theres no U.N. resolution here, Dubya can do whatever he wants. Thats why he said this could take years because he intends to hunt everyone of these dirtbags down. Patience please- a terrorist free America comes first.

[boycott]

"I admit that I have gone over the edge."

You haven't gone over the edge. You're just sick of all this bs like the rest of us. The government needs to run the illegals out of our country.

We'll have to run them out if the government doesn't. The government needs to realize that they need to act or the citizens will.

[mercy]

You are right. It would make things worse. But suddenly I understand all those pukeannon supporters I have gone round and round with on FR over the years. I can not vote for a man who lets terrs run loose in America. In fact it makes me so nuts that not voting will not be enough. I will have to actively work to throw him out of office.

[Jaidyn]

You are just having a bad night. Maybe you are listening to too many observers at the same time. Things are happening that we don't know about. You can be assured that every mideasterner is being watched like a hawk. Maybe it is better to leave these suspious types here than allow them to be where no one knows where they are. They can be arrested at any time. Like President Bush said, we are all part of this war and will win it.

[Eagle74]

mercy, your feeling helpless. I prescribe a nice new gun, take it to the range, and burn some powder. Then put this anthrax attack into perspective, more americans die every day in accidents, than anthrax has killed in total. The fear out there is unreasonable. It's obviously the fear of the unknown, which is working on us. But, the future is always unknown, step into it with courage. "It may be better to be live jakal, than a dead lion. But it's even better to be a live lion, and it's usually easier." Robert Heinlein

[mercy]

You are right. I'm having a bad night. I think it was watching my wife at the PO (we have to pick up our mail) sorting the mail with a mask and gloves on. We get stuff from the E. Coast. I'm very mad. I'm very very mad. I must not tell you ALL about it because I do not wish to live the rest of my days under surviellance.

[BearPaw1]

Oh, and I suppose you support that lily white trash we had for a president the past 8 years????? You know the one who left all the mess at the White House for the now President George W. Bush. The 42nd President that was impeached, the one who gave away information to the Chinese, let them have Long Beach, had so many people around him die from knowing to much, the one who drops his pants for anything in a skirt or not a skirt, the one who said "I did not have sex with that woman", the one who said, "it depends on what the word "is" "is", the one who let all those "Rag Heads" in this country to begin with - You, would support a man like that, instead of George W. Bush, who has been in office 11 months and has done more in 11 months than the 42nd President did in 8 years? Look in the mirror and ask yourself if you could live and sleep with yourself if you can vote for a man like that. And, if the answer if "yes", don't let the door hit you in the butt on the way out here.

[classygreeneyedblonde]

The FBI, however, said in its alert that authorities had not yet corroborated the information but decided to issue a warning. The warning was sent Wednesday to law enforcement agencies in California, Washington, Oregon, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Montana and Idaho.

[theirjustdue]

Regarding #59.

Your frustration is understandable and your venting here is amoungst friends.

I'm glad you are not on the battlefield though. Too many have snapped in war and been lost charging a machine gun nest, without any real hope of accomplishing anything.