al - Qaida Threat Included in Bush Memo ( more info

[Florida_Geek]

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Sept-11-Bush-Memo.html

al - Qaida Threat Included in Bush Memo
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: April 9, 2004


Filed at 10:05 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush's August 2001 briefing on terrorism threats, described largely as a historical document, included information from three months earlier that al-Qaida was trying to send operatives into the United States for an explosives attack, according to several people who have seen the memo.

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The second-to-last bullet told the president that there were numerous -- at least 70 -- terror-related investigations under way by the FBI in 2001 involving matters or people on U.S. soil, the sources said.

And the final bullet told the president of a recent intelligence report indicating al-Qaida operatives were trying to get inside the United States to carry out an attack with explosives, the sources said. There was no specifics about the timing or target, the sources said

The sources said the briefing memo did not provide the exact date of that intelligence but made clear it was in the 2001 time frame, and that FBI and other agencies were investigating it. The information had been provided to intelligence and law enforcement agencies well before Bush's briefing, the sources said.

They said final bullet in the presidential memo was based on an intelligence report received in May 2001 that indicated bin Laden operatives were trying to cross from Canada into the United States for an attack.

.more at AP

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