Bush under fire over terror alert

Members of the United States Congress have demanded to know whether the government was given enough information to head off the 11 September attacks.
Their comments come after the White House acknowledged that President Bush was told a month before 11 September of a plot to hijack American planes by Osama Bin Laden.

I believe and others believe if it had been acted upon properly we may have had a different situation on 11 September

Senator Richard Shelby
The revelation has put the White House on the defensive to explain why stricter security measures were not taken and why the public was not informed.

Senate Majority leader Tom Daschle, a Democrat, said he was "gravely concerned", and asked President Bush to hand over to congress all the information he received.

"Clearly there is a lot more to be learned before we can come to any final conclusion... but it clearly raises some very important questions that have to be asked and have to be answered," he said.

"Why did it take eight months for us to receive this information? And secondly, what specific actions were taken by the White House in response?" Senator Daschle asked.

Senator Richard Shelby, the Republican vice-chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee was also critical of the White House.

"I believe and others believe if it had been acted upon properly we may have had a different situation on 11 September," Senator Shelby said

The White House said on Thursday that it will co-operate with congressional investigations.

'Appropriate action'

But the White House insists took "all appropriate action" in response to the warnings of attacks on the United States it received last summer.

Beginning in May and continuing throughout the summer, the government received heightened reports on threats to US interests and territory, most of it focused on threats abroad, said Mr Fleischer.

"As a result, several actions were taken to button down security," he said.

The information was passed to the president during routine intelligence briefings and the "appropriate agencies" were notified, he said.

But no public warning was given.

The US intelligence community has already been heavily criticised for its failure to detect warning signs of the 11 September suicide attacks on New York and Washington.

The attacks, which saw hijacked aircraft flown into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, are believed to have been carried out by Bin Laden's al-Qaeda terror group.

BBC Washington correspondent Justin Webb says the timing of the White House admission is significant, as a congressional committee is about to start hearings into intelligence failings before 11 September.

The White House did not want to be put on the defensive with leaks about what the president knew, our correspondent says.

Flight school warning

The White House has denied that a memo last July from the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Arizona office could have prevented the attacks had it been acted on.

The memo is reported to have warned that groups like al-Qaeda might have sent students to flight schools in the US, but none of the people identified in the document had any connection with the attacks.


The al-Qaeda network is thought to be behind the 11 September attacks

Even though the memo was reviewed, the FBI did not take any action on its central recommendation - that flight school records and visa applications by foreign students be cross-referenced.

And the agency did not connect the memo with the case of Zacharias Moussaoui, a Frenchman of Moroccan descent who was arrested in August after seeking flight training in Minnesota - and saying he was not particularly interested in learning to land aeroplanes.

Mr Moussaoui is facing trial in the US, accused of conspiring with Bin Laden, the hijackers and others to commit the 11 September attacks.

The FBI Director, Robert Mueller, has repeatedly said he wished agents had acted more aggressively in putting the Arizona and Minnesota leads together.

Following the attacks, the FBI is to create a special counter-terrorism unit to oversee all its terrorism investigations.