On the 25th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, the Trump administration has made public a set of CIA documents revealing that both Bill Clinton and George W. Bush were advised about potential Al Qaeda plans to use aircraft packed with explosives in attacks on the U.S.
Released on Friday, these 71 documents showed that each president was given detailed briefings regarding threats to national security during their time in office.
A Presidential Daily Briefing for President Clinton, dated September 10, 1998, indicated that Al Qaeda’s leader had intentions to attack U.S. soil. The briefing highlighted that intelligence agencies had received multiple claims from dubious sources about Usama Bin Laden’s plans for an attack in the United States.
“Bin Ladin late last month said his preferred option is to strike the U.S. on its own soil in Washington,” the report cautioned. It also stated that the same group responsible for the U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania could potentially crash an explosive-laden aircraft into an American city.
In a subsequent briefing on December 4, 1998, titled “Bin Ladin Preparing To Hijack U.S. Aircraft,” Clinton’s advisors pointed out that certain members of Bin Laden’s network had undergone hijacking training and warned that he might be considering various forms of attacks against U.S. aircraft.
“Bin Ladin might implement plans to hijack a U.S. aircraft before the beginning of Ramadan on 20 December and that two members of the operational team had evaded security checks during a recent trial run at an unidentified New York airport,” the document stated.
By February 11, 2000, Presidential intelligence officials reported seizing a manifesto that outlined possible targets, including symbolic sites like the Statue of Liberty.
Warnings continued into Bush’s presidency, with a file titled “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.” presented to him on July 25, 2001.
“Al-Qa’ida members—including some who are U.S. citizens—have resided in or traveled to the U.S. for years, and the group appears to maintain a support structure that could facilitate attacks,” the memo warned.
The document also noted that following U.S. missile strikes on his base in Afghanistan in 1998, Bin Laden expressed a desire for retaliation in Washington, adding that 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.”
The release of these documents is part of President Trump’s effort to enhance transparency between the government and citizens, which follows earlier disclosings of long-held secret files related to the assassinations of prominent figures such as John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy, and Martin Luther King Jr.
