US News
US officials: Attack with al-Qaeda hallmarks was imminent
By DPA
Aug 10, 2006, 19:00 GMT

Washington - US officials said Thursday that the terrorist plot to bring down commercial planes from Britain to the US had all the hallmarks of an Al-Qaeda operation.

The plot was 'well advanced' and in the 'final steps of preparation before execution' when British police moved against 21 suspects now in custody, Michael Chertoff, US Secretary of Homeland Security, told reporters.

He said that US officials could not definitively make the connection to al-Qaeda before the investigation was finished.

Chertoff said that US security officials were closely involved in the British probe in recent weeks when it became clear that the plotting had taken an 'accelerated' turn in 'the direction of targeting the United States.'

British investigators had been watching the plotters for a longer period of time, Chertoff said.

The 'sophisticated' plot involved numerous conspirators around the world and was 'suggestive of an al-Qaeda plot,' Chertoff said. The plotters had assembled all of the ingredients and were 'well on their way' to carrying out major suicide attacks on a number of US carriers, he said.

US officials believed that British police had 'significantly disrupted' the plot, but there was no assumption it had been 'thwarted.'

Air traffic has come nearly to a halt in Britain but was continuing with some delays in the US.

US Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez vowed that the world would work intensely to dismantle the terrorist plot 'one person at a time.'

'We are a nation at war,' Gonzalez said.

'The threat is real,' he said, warning of an enemy who 'dreams every night of wreaking destruction on freedom-loving countries.'

US federal air marshals were being sent to the United Kingdom to expand coverage on flights bound for the United States, officials said.

Although the plot was dismantled just less than five weeks before the fifth anniversary of the al-Qaeda terrorist attacks on US soil, Chertoff said there was no evidence that al-Qaeda was 'motivated by anniversaries.'

Rather, he said the plot was 'reminiscent' of the 1995 plot by terrorist mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to blow up nearly a dozen US airliners over the Pacific, an operation known as Bojinka. The plot was uncovered and dismantled in the Philippines, but Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was at large until his 2003 arrest in Pakistan. His whereabouts have been kept secret since then.

The United States hiked its overall terrorism threat level Thursday to the second-highest category.

The US raised to orange the threat level for all domestic and international flights and to red - the highest possible level - for flights coming in from Britain, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said in a statement.

No liquids would be allowed on aircraft as part of extra security measures on flights to and within the US, Chertoff said. Special exceptions would be made for baby formula and medications, but only after the substances were investigated by security officials.