Newly Declassified 9/11 Documents Reveal Years of Warnings About Bin Laden and Hijacking Threats

More than 100 pages of newly declassified intelligence documents are shedding additional light on what Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush were told about Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda in the years leading up to the September 11 terrorist attacks.

The records, released on the 25th anniversary of 9/11, include portions of highly classified President’s Daily Brief materials dating from 1998 through September 2001. They show that American intelligence agencies had been tracking bin Laden’s desire to attack the United States years before hijackers ultimately struck New York and Washington.

A July 1998 intelligence assessment described reports suggesting that bin Laden was planning an attack inside the United States, although officials questioned the reliability of the sources and lacked detailed information about his operatives in the country. Other intelligence raised concerns about possible attacks in Washington and other prominent locations.

By December 1998, intelligence officials were specifically warning about the possibility of aircraft hijackings. One report said bin Laden and his allies were preparing attacks in the United States that could include hijacking an aircraft in an effort to secure the release of imprisoned extremist Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman and others.

The intelligence also indicated that members of bin Laden’s network had received hijacking training and that suspected operatives had reportedly managed to evade security checks during a trial run at an unidentified New York airport. Despite those warnings, officials did not have information identifying the specific plot that would ultimately be carried out on September 11.

Other documents show that intelligence officials were concerned bin Laden could obtain weapons of mass destruction. Analysts investigated whether he had acquired a nuclear weapon and also warned that he could attempt to obtain chemical or biological weapons for use against a major target.

Warnings continued after Bush took office in January 2001. Seven presidential briefs issued during July and August reportedly highlighted an increased terrorist threat, culminating in the well-known Aug. 6 briefing titled “Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US.” That document referenced possible hijackings, suspicious activity inside the country and surveillance of federal buildings in New York.

The newly released material provides additional context to a central finding of the 9/11 Commission: government agencies possessed numerous pieces of intelligence about al Qaeda but failed to assemble them into a sufficiently clear picture of the coming attack. Many of the warnings concerned general threats or possible plots without identifying the eventual targets, timing or operational details.

The release follows years of efforts to make additional records examined by the 9/11 Commission available to the public. The Public Interest Declassification Board had identified the presidential briefing material and interviews with senior Clinton and Bush administration officials as high-priority records for review.

Twenty-five years after the attacks, the documents offer a more detailed view of the warnings that reached the highest levels of the federal government before nearly 3,000 people were killed. They also illustrate the gap that existed between recognizing al Qaeda as a growing threat and obtaining the specific intelligence necessary to identify and disrupt the September 11 plot before it was carried out.