Reply #5: Yahoo calls them on it... bush "gilded a lilly"! [View All]

[leftchick]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060210/ts_alt_afp/usattacksbushthwart_060210080140

LA skyscraper plot never got beyond talk: analysts Fri Feb 10, 3:04 AM ET



SINGAPORE (AFP) - An alleged Al-Qaeda plot to crash an airplane into a Los Angeles skyscraper but foiled with the help of Asian nations never got beyond the discussion stage, security analysts said.

President George W. Bush and other US officials could have revealed new details of the plot Thursday in an effort to forge tighter international cooperation in the so-called "war against terror", the analysts said.

Bush said Khalid Sheikh Mohammed planned to have operatives hijack an airplane, use shoe bombs to breach the cockpit doors and fly the jet into Los Angeles' tallest building, the 310-metre (1,017-foot) US Bank Tower, also known as Library Tower.

Bush said that instead of using Arab hijackers, as in the attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, the plot called for "young men from Southeast Asia whom he believed would not arouse as much suspicion."

"I think he is gilding the lily a little," said Clive Williams, adjunct professor at the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre of the Australian National University.