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Airliner Terrorism Threat Has Passed, Officials Say
The terrorism threat that led to cancellation of several flights into and within the United States, which included the concern of possible WMD use, has passed and no further cancellations are planned, U.S. officials said yesterday (see GSN, Feb. 2). “At this point we do not have any new threat reporting, targeting specific flights, like we did over the weekend,” White House press secretary Scott McClellan said. No arrests were made in relation to the cancelled flights, and some law-enforcement officials were unsure if the measures taken had disrupted planned attacks, according to Associated Press. A senior law enforcement official said yesterday, though, that gathered intelligence indicates that al-Qaeda continues to be highly interested in airliners and weapons of mass destruction (Leslie Miller, Associated Press/Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 3). Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said that “very specific information” had led to the canceled flights over the weekend and yesterday. “It didn’t quite have the specificity with regard to the nature of the attack, but there was certainly enough credibility associated with the when and the where, the date and the flight” to cancel the flights, he said. He also suggested that that more flights may be canceled in the future. “On a day-to-day basis, one of the most difficult jobs in town is basically distinguishing between that which may be a specific threat and that which is just occasion to give us disinformation and make us react to it,” Ridge said. “I wish I could look into a crystal ball and say it’s not going to happen again. I can’t do that,” he added (CNN.com, Feb. 2).
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