Free Republic

Excerpt - Intelligence agencies have been warned that al Qaeda may be planning to attack air and rail travel in Europe in actions that may occur during the busy holiday travel season, CBS News has learned exclusively. In separate interviews with Arab and other intelligence sources, CBS News has been told that the warnings come from interrogations of al Qaeda suspects who recently left Afghanistan and Pakistan. "One suspect said plans for repeating the Heathrow attempt (a reference to the failed 'liquid bomb' plot interrupted in August) were all prepared. It is now a matter of taking action," said one...

A group of alleged terrorists arrested in London in August planned to blow up airliners over U.S. cities to maximize casualties, rather than over the Atlantic Ocean as many intelligence officials originally thought, according to recent remarks by a senior FBI official. The comments by Mark Mershon, head of the FBI's New York field office, indicate that U.S. and British intelligence officials now think that the airliner plot was aimed at maximizing the potential loss of life and economic impact. "The plan was bring them down over U.S. cities, not over the ocean," Mershon said Oct. 24 at the Infosecurity...

Police statement on airline bombing plot LONDON (Reuters) - Following is the full text of a statement issued by London Deputy Commissioner, Paul Stephenson on Thursday morning: "We are confident that we have disrupted a plan by terrorists to cause untold death and destruction and commit mass murder. The Commissioner has been fully briefed and he is at New Scotland Yard today. He and I want to pay tribute to officers from the Met's Anti-Terrorist Branch and the security services for the work they have undertaken to disrupt these activities. We believe that the terrorists' aim was to smuggle...