[ 2011-05-13 ]

Sama bin Laden

Osama bin Laden was plotting attacks on Britain
The discovery of a “treasure trove” of
intelligence material at his hideout in Abbottabad
in Pakistan, which was removed during searches by
US Navy Seals, has led to a reassessment of his
role in planning al-Qaeda operations.

While no concrete details of plans for attacks in
Britain have been released, the intelligence does
contain instructions to attack transport hubs that
provoked an alert in January. There is also
evidence that he wanted to target President Barack
Obama and was urging his followers to replicate
the impact of the September 11 attacks, even
considering this year’s 10th anniversary as a
possible date.

US officials have said that bin Laden was a
“driving force” behind every recent al-Qaeda
plot, dispensing advice to the leaders of groups
across the world.

He told them to target trains as well as aircraft,
reflected in an alert issued by the security
services in January that warned of plots against
transport hubs by al-Qaeda’s “international
operations wing” designed to cause “a large
number of casualties”. The January warning
detailed plans for “one or more attacks against
Europe, including the UK”, aimed at
“high-profile Western targets” and using
“vehicle-borne” or “hand-delivered” bombs
and firearms.

The threat level was raised from “substantial”
to “severe” for transport hubs, meaning an
attack was “highly likely” and led to British
Transport Police calling in extra officers.

The disclosures could cause embarrassment at MI6,
which had assessed that the al-Qaeda leader had
minimal involvement in planning attacks and did
not have a unit dedicated to tracking him down,
officials have said.

MI6 persisted in its judgment even after
intelligence emerged that bin Laden gave his
approval for Mumbai-style attacks in Britain,
using couriers to send a message to al-Qaeda
followers.

So far, no new plots have been uncovered, but
British intelligence officials, who are sharing
the information with the US, say it will take
months to go through all the material and
translate it from Arabic. One official said the
intelligence had given them “new insights”
into bin Laden’s role in al-Qaeda. Another said
they only had “one side of the conversation”
and it was “too early to know if anyone was
listening” when he sent instructions.

Navy Seals recovered about 100 flash drives and
five computers during the 40- minute search of the
compound, along with a handwritten journal.

Bin Laden’s orders found in Abbottabad suggest
attacking Los Angeles rather than New York, and
other smaller US cities, striking on significant
dates, such as Independence Day on July 4 and the
10th anniversary of September 11.

The aim, he told his followers, was to kill more
Americans in a single attack in order to drive
them out of the Arab world. Bin Laden even went as
far as to try to work out how many Americans
al-Qaeda would have to kill to force US troops out
of the Middle East. He concluded that the
smaller-scale attacks that had marked the years
since September 11 were not enough and that only a
body count of thousands would change US policy.


The documents also show that bin Laden was
communicating with Ayman al-Zawahiri, his deputy,
and with Atiyah Abd al-Rahman, another senior
commander. He was also in touch with al-Qaeda in
Yemen, known as al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula,
which has emerged as a far greater threat in
recent months than al-Qaeda “central”.

Source - Other

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